Page 41 of Saint Céline
Mrs. Montgomery sighed softly. “You’re asking me to pay full tuition for a girl who isn’t family.”
“She might as well be,” Katherine said, quieter now but no less certain. “She’s here every day. She helps me with everything. She makes this house feel less empty. Please, Mom. I know I’m a genius. You and Dad say it all the time. But being a genius doesn’t stop me from being lonely. Céline would fix that. And she deserves better than public school. She’s wasted there.”
Another silence stretched between them. I closed my eyes and tried to imagine what Mrs. Montgomery’s face looked like right now. Kind but practical.
Finally Mrs. Montgomery spoke again, her voice gentle. “If we do this, we keep the name change between us. Selena’s mother has already been through enough. We won’t upset her by telling her we’re turning her daughter into someone else. We’ll handle the paperwork quietly through the school. Understood?”
“Yes,” Katherine said quickly, relief flooding her tone. “Thank you. Thank you!”
I stepped back before they could see me. My chest felt tight and warm all at once. They were going to pay for it. Katherine’s mother was going to pay for everything because she knew her daughter was lonely and brilliant and difficult, and somehow I had become the perfect solution.
* * *
Three weeks later Mrs. Montgomery drove us to Bellamont Academy for a “tour.” The campus looked like a church built for rich people, grey stone buildings covered in ivy, tall windows, and black iron gates with the Bellamont crest worked into the center. Students crossed the courtyard wearing navy uniforms and expensive coats, coffee cups in hand, moving with the careless confidence of people who had never once wondered whether they belonged somewhere. My stomach twisted thesecond we stepped out of the car. Not with fear, but hunger for more than I was handed in life.
Girls passed us speaking casually about ski trips in Aspen, summer programs in Florence, a yacht party in Nantucket, and internships arranged through someone’s father. They sounded bored while describing lives I could barely imagine. Katherine walked beside me like none of it was remarkable. Mrs. Montgomery adjusted my blazer collar lightly. “Nervous?”
“Yes.”
“That’s normal.”
Easy for her to say. Everything around her had probably looked like this her entire life.
The admissions office smelled like polished wood and expensive perfume. Portraits of former Bellamont graduates lined the walls: senators, judges, CEOs, women with sharp smiles standing beside men who looked trained never to sweat. The woman at the front desk smiled immediately when she saw Mrs. Montgomery.
“Mrs. Montgomery. Lovely to see you again.”
Katherine rolled her eyes slightly behind the receptionist’s back. I almost smiled.
The interview itself blurred together afterwards. Questions. Grades. Polite laughter. Mrs. Montgomery smoothly introduced me as “My niece Céline. She’s recently relocated from France.”
The lie landed softly in the room as if it belonged there already. No one questioned it. Not really. The admissions director asked whether I missed Europe, and something strange happened. I answered smoothly, without hesitation. “Yes,” I said with a small smile. “Mostly the pace. America feels louder.”
The woman nodded immediately. “Oh, I completely understand.”
And just like that, they believed me.
Katherine looked at me in awe the entire drive home. “How did you do that?”
“Do what?”
“Lie like that. You didn’t flinch.”
I stared out the car window at the dark ocean beyond the cliffs. “I don’t know.”
But I did know. I had spent my entire life learning how to become whatever kept people calm. Pleasant daughter. Quiet girl. Grateful poor child. Easy guest. Céline was just another version. Only prettier.
By the time Bellamont accepted me that spring, Katherine was more excited than I was. She spent two full weekends rebuilding my wardrobe.
“No logos,” she informed me while tossing sweaters across her bedroom. “Actual rich people don’t wear logos unless they’re having a nervous breakdown.”
“You sound so paranoid.”
“You know I’m right.”
She taught me which fork to use, how to pronounce brands properly, how to tell old money from new money, how to look bored during conversations about wealth, and how to answer questions without giving real information. And slowly, terrifyingly, it worked.
At Bellamont, people looked at me differently than they ever had before. Not with pity. Not caution. Interest. The boys moved closer when I laughed. Girls invited me to places after one conversation. Teachers remembered my name. For the first time in my life, people looked at me and saw someone worth moving toward instead of away from.
