Hell Week by Rosemary Clement-Moore Page B

emotion surged past my fallen defenses.

    "Beta Pi totally wants me!" Holly had talked her into putting down her next highest choices after the Deltas. The Betas were brunette and bubbly, so we'd figured she'd be a fit.

    Tricia bounced off to find other Betas; Holly bent down to frown critically at my face. "Are you feeling all right?"

    Clearly, I looked as bad as I felt. "It's really hot in here." Someone squealed nearby and my eye twitched in reaction.

    "We're almost done." This was relative. There was still a lot of alphabet in line behind us. Darn those Ss. The tradi- tion was to release the rushees--now called pledges--all at once out into the quad, where our new sisterhood waited to greet us and escort us back to Greek Row.

    I reached the front of the line; at least once I got my bid-- I'd put down SAXi first, as I promised Holly, and the Zetas second, because I was assured of an invite, since I was a legacy--the matter would be settled, and I could find a seat in one of the chairs that ringed the room and observe from a small distance.

    "Quinn," I told the Rho Gamma behind the table full of stationery boxes. "Maggie."

    "Here you are." She held out a cream-colored envelope with a smile. "Good luck."

    If I'd been thinking clearly, maybe I would have expected it. But my brain thrummed in my skull, as if I'd had about fifty espresso shots. As soon as my fingers closed on the in- vitation, a gray-white light blossomed on my retinas, like when you press on your closed eyelids and make a ghostly impression in the black. Only the brightness kept streaming in on my optic nerve, carrying impressions and images too rapid and bewildering to interpret, a moir� pattern splitting and repeating; infinite variety of waking dreams, pushed into my brain like water through a fire hose.

    Consciousness tripped like a fuse, and everything went black.

    F F F

    I woke up on the floor, with Jenna patting my hand and Holly leaning over me anxiously. "What happened?"

    "You fainted," Holly said as I struggled to sit up.

    Surely not. How . . . girly. "Really?"

    "Don't worry about it," the Rho Gamma said, correctly interpreting my reddening face. "Too much emotion, girls forget to eat. Happens all the time."

    "I never forget to eat." They helped me to my feet; my thighs trembled, but it was better than lying there with the Ss stepping over me to get their bids. As if anyone would notice one more Drama Girl.

    They walked with me to the chairs by the wall, and as I sat, Jenna turned to Holly. "There's some bottled water in the coolers behind the tables. Would you grab one for Maggie?"

    "Really, I'm fine--" But Holly was already headed over to where the other Rho Gammas were handing out the bids.

    Jenna sat beside me and put a comforting hand on my shoulder. "I know it's overwhelming."

    I sunk my head into my hands, rubbing my pounding temples. "Tell me about it."

    I didn't expect her to take me literally. "We Sigmas have a hard time in the middle of all this excitement, though some of us are more sensitive than others."

    Her face conveyed nothing, and everything. She might have just been talking about a mundane sensitivity to emo- tional stress. But she met my gaze evenly, significantly. "I could tell you're one of the more sensitive ones."

    "So . . ." I formed my next question carefully. "I'm not the only one?"

    Jenna smiled, as if my ready acceptance pleased her. "Well, no one has ever fainted before."

    "Oh." I had to wrap my head around that. Of all the things I thought I might hear today, that hadn't been it.

    She laid her hand on my knee, pressing lightly to weight her words. "I think you're used to keeping your specialness a secret, Maggie, so I don't have to tell you that we Sigmas don't talk about this outside the house. You probably shouldn't talk about it much with your pledge class. Most of them have no idea of the latent potential inside them."

    "I don't understand." I felt the way I had when Dr. Smyth explained