After Abby and I had been issued our uniforms and shoes, we returned to the dorm. On the way I told her the story of Gisselle's car accident and subsequent paralysis. She listened attentively, her dark eyes watering when I described Martin's funeral and Daddy's deep depression during the days immediately following.

"So you can't say the accident made her this way," Abby said.

"No. Unfortunately, Gisselle was Gisselle long before, and I'm afraid she will be this way for a long time yet." Abby laughed.

"Don't you have any brothers or sisters?" I asked her. "No." After a long pause she added, "I wasn't supposed to be born."

"What do you mean?"

"I was an accident. My parents didn't want to have any children," she said.

"Why?"

"They didn't want any," she replied, but I sensed there were deeper, darker reasons, reasons she knew but couldn't voice. She had already been more revealing than she'd intended, which was something I attributed to our getting along so well so quickly. It was natural for Abby and I to want to be close. Except for Gisselle, we two were the only girls in the dorm to be attending Greenwood for the first time. I felt that, in time, I could tell her my story; that she was someone I could trust to keep it locked away.

Back in our quad, we tried on our uniforms. Despite the sizes on the labels, they were big enough for us to swim in them. I decided these clothes were designed to keep our femininity a state secret. Dressed in a baggy blouse with a skirt that touched our ankles, we confronted each other in the sitting room and both fell into hysterics. Gisselle looked pleased. Our laughter brought the other girls out of their rooms where they had been organizing their things.

"What's so funny?" Samantha asked.

"What's so funny? Look at us," I said.

"The Iron Lady designed these uniforms herself," Vicki explained. "So don't complain too loudly."

"Or she'll burn you at the stake," Jacqueline added.

"At least we can wear our own clothes on weekends, at the socials, and when we get invited to Mrs. Clairborne's tea," Kate said.

"Mrs. Clairborne's tea?" Gisselle remarked. "I can't wait."

"Oh, she always has the best little cakes," Kate said. "And pralines!"

"A few dozen of which Chubs manages to shove into her purse and then hide somewhere in the room. I don't know why we don't have rats," Jacqueline said.

"What is this tea exactly?" I asked.

"It's not just one tea. It's frequent and by invitation only. Everyone knows who's been invited and who's not, and the teachers think more highly of you if you're invited more than once."

"Three times makes you a Tea Queen," Jacqueline declared.

"Tea Queen?" Abby looked at me, and I shrugged.

"You keep your tea bag each time you're invited and you pin it on a wall in your room like an award or a commendation," Vicki explained. "It's a Greenwood tradition and an honor. Jacki's right. Those who are invited often are treated better."

"She's saying that because she's a Tea Queen," Jacqueline quipped. "She was invited four times last year."

"And what about you?" Gisselle asked.

"Once. Kate was invited twice, as was Samantha."

"All new girls are invited to the first tea of the year, but that doesn't count because it's automatic," Vicki continued. "Where are the teas held?" Abby asked.

"At the Clairborne mansion. Mrs. Penny will take you up there and give you the history of the house. Here it's almost as important to know those facts as it is to know the facts in American or European history," Jacqueline said. Vicki nodded.

"I can't wait," Gisselle said. "Only I'm not sure I can take the excitement." Kate laughed and Samantha smiled, but Vicki looked shocked by what amounted to blasphemy at Greenwood.

"So," Gisselle continued, "when's the first monthly social, the one with boys?"

"Oh, not for nearly a month. Didn't you read the social calendar in your packet?" Jacqueline said.

"A month? I told Daddy this was like being in a nunnery," she wailed at me. "What about getting into the city?" she quickly asked. The girls looked at each other.

"What do you mean?" Vicki said.

"Getting into the city. What's so hard to understand? You're going to be the valedictorian."

Vicki blanched.

"I . . . well . . ."

"None of us ever left the campus on our own," Jacqueline said.

"Why not?" Gisselle demanded. "There must be places in the city to go where we can meet boys."

"For one thing, you have to have a permission form on file to be able to leave the campus on your own," Vicki explained.

"What? You mean I'm really a prisoner here?"

"Just call your parents and have them file the form," Vicki said with a shrug.

"What about the rest of you? Are you telling me none of you cared before?" No one spoke. "What are you all? Virgins?" Gisselle cried in frustration. Her face was as red as a steamed lobster claw.

Samantha's mouth dropped open. Kate stared with a half-amused, half-amazed smile on her face. Vicki remained nonplussed, but Jacqueline looked ashamed. Abby and I exchanged quick glances.

"Don't tell me you've been obeying all these dumb rules," Gisselle continued, shaking her head in disbelief. "Demerits can—" Vicki began.

"Ruin your chances to become a Tea Queen. I get it," Gisselle said. "There are more important things to pin on your walls than old tea bags," Gisselle snapped, then rolled her wheelchair across the room toward Vicki, who stepped back. "Like love letters. Ever get one?"

Vicki looked around and saw that all eyes were on her. She stammered for a moment.

"I . . . I've got . . . to start my assigned reading for European history," she said. "See you later." She turned and walked quickly to her room. Gisselle spun around and fixed her gaze on Jacqueline.

"Last year a couple of the boys from Rosewood wanted to sneak into our dorm on a weekend night," she revealed. "And?"

"We didn't have the nerve," Jacqueline confessed.

"Well it's this year, and we have the nerve now," Gisselle said. She looked at me. "We'll show them how girls from New Orleans party. Right, Ruby?"

"Don't start, Gisselle. Please."

"Start what? Living? You'd like me to be an obedient little Greenwood girl and roll around quietly in my wheelchair with my mouth shut, my lap full of dried old tea bags, and my knees bound together, wouldn't you?"

"Gisselle, please . . ."

"Who's got a cigarette?" she demanded quickly. Kate's eyes widened. She shook her head. "Samantha?"

"No, I don't smoke."

"Don't smoke. Don't see boys. What do you girls do, read fan magazines and masturbate?"

It was as if thunder had shaken the dorm. I was so embarrassed by my sister's outburst I had to look down at the floor.

"All right," Gisselle continued, "don't worry. I'm here now. Things will be different. I promise. It just so happens," she said with a smile, "I smuggled in some cigarettes of my own."

"Gisselle, you'll get everyone in trouble, and the first day too," I protested.

"You're not chicken, are you?" she asked Jacqueline, Kate, and Samantha. "Good," she said when they didn't respond. "Come into my room. You can help me organize my records and we'll share a cigarette. Maybe I'll get us something better soon," she added, smiling. She spun her chair around and headed for our room. No one moved. "Well?" she snapped.

Jacqueline started after her first, and then Kate and Samantha followed.

"Close the door," Gisselle ordered when they were all in our room.

"I never thought twin sisters could be so different," Abby remarked and then realized what she had said. "Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't mean . . ."

"That's all right. I never thought so either. Until I met her," I said and bit my tongue. But it was too late.

"Met her?"

"It's a long story," I said. "I wasn't supposed to tell it to anyone here."

"I understand," Abby said. From the way she looked when she said it, I believed she did understand.

"But I don't mind telling it to you," I added. She smiled.

"Why don't we go into my room," she suggested. I looked back at the closed door behind which Gisselle was holding court with her new protégées. It was a scene I wanted no part of at the moment.

"Good idea," I said. "While we talk, I'll organize the things of Gisselle's you had to take. I'd better go through some of it too," I said, throwing a glance back at our room. "No telling what else she smuggled in here."

A little over an hour later, Mrs. Penny came to our quad to see how we were all doing. If she had smelled any smoke coming from our room, she didn't reveal it. Frankly, I didn't see how she could miss it. The stench was on the girls' clothing and lingered in the air despite their opening our windows.

"I'm also here to formally pass on Mrs. Clairborne's invitation to Abby, Gisselle, and Ruby to attend tea at her home on Saturday at two," she said. "You can wear what you wish, but you should dress appropriately," she added, winking. "It's a formal tea."

"Oh no! And I left my formal tea dress home," Gisselle said.

"Pardon, dear?"

"Nothing," Gisselle said, smiling. I saw how Samantha and Kate were smiling behind Mrs. Penny's back. Jacki was wearing her usual smirk, but it was clear that all three were still in awe of my sister.

"Good. Well then, dinner's in less than fifteen minutes," Mrs. Penny sang out. "New girls don't have chores until the second week," she added and then sauntered off.

"What was that supposed to mean?" Gisselle inquired, wheeling herself into the center of the sitting room. "What chores?"