Chapter 10 Taking Up Space

• The culinary showcase happens in the grand hall of the student center, floor-to-ceiling windows, white tablecloths, the whole department dressed up like it's a wedding instead of a class project, and every single person who mattered on this campus packed into one room at seven o'clock on a Friday night.
• I wore red. I want that on the record, because for three years I'd dressed to disappear at events like this — dark colors, nothing fitted, anything that might let me blend into a wall if a room turned cruel — and this time I stood in front of my closet an hour before and pulled out the one dress I owned that actually fit the way I wanted it to fit, the one that made me feel like I took up exactly the amount of space I was supposed to take up, and I put it on and did not apologize to my mirror for a single thing it showed me.
• Priya cried a little when she saw me. Rhett, when he picked me up, went completely silent for a second in a way that told me more than any compliment could have.