Janie Face to Face - By Caroline B. Cooney Page 0,3

Janie found it.

Now, when she looked back—which wasn’t far; it had happened only three years ago—she saw a long string of goofs and stubbornness. If only I had been nicer! she sometimes said to herself.

But being nice in a kidnap situation is tough.

Janie’s college essay spilled more truth than she had ever given anybody but her former boyfriend, Reeve. Still, it omitted two other reasons for going to college.

She wanted to make lifelong girlfriends. Sarah-Charlotte would always be her best friend, but at some disturbing level, Janie wanted to be free of Sarah-Charlotte; free to go her own way, whatever that was, and at her own speed, whatever that was.

And she wanted to meet the man who would become her husband.

Janie still loved Reeve, of course. But the boy next door had hurt her more than anyone. Whenever he was home from college (he was three years ahead of her), Reeve would plead, “I was stupid, Janie. But I’m older and wiser.”

He was older, anyway. And still the cutest guy on earth. But wiser?

Janie didn’t think so.

Reeve was a boyfriend now only by habit. She and Reeve texted all the time, and she followed his Facebook page. She herself didn’t have a photograph or a single line of information on her own wall; she was on Facebook solely to see what other people were doing. She never posted.

Janie’s other mother, Miranda Johnson, was excited and worried for Janie. Miranda’s life had collapsed, and this year, she was living through Janie. Miranda was so eager to see Janie launched at the university. It was Miranda who drove Janie into the city on the day her college dorm opened.

Later, Janie learned that each of her Spring parents had arranged to take that day off from work so that they could bring her to college. But Janie said no to them, which she had pretty much said ever since they first spoke on the phone. (“Is it the only syllable you know?” her brother Stephen once demanded.)

On the first day of college, Janie and her mother took the dorm elevator to the fifth floor and found her room. The single window had a sliver view of the Hudson River. Janie could hardly wait for her mother to leave so she could begin her new life. She refused Miranda’s help unpacking and nudged her mother back into the hall, where Miranda burst into tears. “Oh, Janie, Janie! I’ll miss you so, Janie!”

Janie tried to stand firm against her mother’s grief. If she herself broke down, she might give up and go home.

The hall was packed with everybody else moving in, each freshman glaring silent warnings to their own parents: Don’t even think about crying like that woman.

“Good-bye, Janie!” cried her mother, inching backward. “I love you, Janie!”

At last the elevator doors closed and Janie was without a parent. She sagged against the wall. Had she done the right thing? Should she run after Miranda and somehow make this easier?

A friendly hand tapped her shoulder. “Hi. I’m Rachel. And you are definitely Janie!”

Everyone in the hall was smiling gently. In minutes, she knew Constance and Mikayla and Robin and Samantha. Nobody bothered with last names. I can skip my last names! thought Janie.

“I’m actually Jane,” she said. “Only my mother calls me Janie.” She had never been called Jane. She felt new and different and safe, hiding under the new syllable along with the new hair. “Jane” sounded sturdier than “Janie.” More adult.

Her actual roommate appeared so late that Janie had been thinking she might not even have a roommate. “Eve,” said the girl, who flung open the door around eleven o’clock that night. “Eve Eggs. I’ve heard every joke there is. Do not use my last name. You and I will be on a first-name basis only.”

“I’m with you,” said Janie.

Her new friends—girls who seemed so poised, and whose grades and SAT scores were so much higher than Janie’s—were nervous in the Big Apple. They thought Janie was the sophisticated one. Everybody she knew back home would think that was a riot.

Rachel loved ballet and wanted Janie to help her find Lincoln Center.

Constance wanted Janie to teach her how to use the subway.

Mikayla had planned to study fashion, but her parents said fashion was shallow and stupid, so Mikayla ended up here, and wanted Janie to take her to fabulous New York stores and fashion districts that dictated what women would wear.

Eve had a list of famous New York places, and wanted to see