Mom held my gaze. Then she stood up from the table and scraped the remainder of her food into the trash can. She put her plate in the sink and turned to me. “I’m going to go to bed,” she said. “You should get some sleep too, honey.”
I watched her walk out of the kitchen. She reminded me a little of a ghost. She’d lost a lot of weight since the accident, and now, instead of walking with the purposeful stride of an attorney who knew what she wanted out of life, the way she used to, she seemed to shuffle from place to place, a vacant look on her pale face. I wondered whether she acted like this at her office, too, and if anyone noticed.
I cleaned up the kitchen, rinsed Mom’s plate, started the dishwasher, and walked upstairs to my room, wondering how it was possible to have an entire conversation without saying anything at all.
chapter 3
By Wednesday, Sam Stone had gotten his own textbooks, so he didn’t have to share with me anymore in trig. And it wasn’t like we had any other reason to talk to each other. The rumor was he had moved from somewhere out in western Massachusetts, but I didn’t feel like it was my place to ask him why. If anyone knew what it felt like to be drilled with unwelcome questions, it was me.
At lunch that day, I was sitting with Jennica and Brian as usual. He had his right arm draped around her, which I figured must make it tough to eat.
“So that new guy, Sam?” Jennica asked. I looked up, startled that she seemed to be reading my mind. “You know,” she continued, “that guy from our trig class?”
“Yeah,” I said.
“So he’s hot, huh?” She leaned forward and grinned at me.
“Jennica!” Brian exclaimed, feigning hurt as he pulled her closer.
“Aw, baby, he’s not as hot as you,” she said.
Brian stuck out his bottom lip in a mock sulk. “Really?”
Jennica giggled. “You’re the hottest of the hot.” She gave him a quick kiss on the lips.
“No, you’re the hottest of the hot,” Brian said in an equally disgusting voice.
“No, you are,” Jennica said, batting her eyelashes.
“No, you are, pookie,” Brian said, leaning forward to kiss her.
Pookie?
“I think I just threw up a little in my mouth,” I muttered. I stood, and the two of them looked up from their love haze.
“What’s wrong?” Jennica asked, blinking at me.
“Nothing. I’m just not hungry anymore. I’ll see you later.” I grabbed my tray and waited for her to ask me where I was going—after all, there weren’t exactly a lot of exciting lunchtime options at Plymouth East—but she had already turned back to Brian.
I threw out my trash and headed out the door to the mostly empty halls. We were allowed to make brief trips to our lockers during lunchtime, but we got in trouble for hanging around too long, so I figured I’d just switch out my morning books for my afternoon ones and go outside. It was overcast, but it hadn’t rained yet, and there was a bench under the big oak tree near the senior parking where I sat when I didn’t feel like sitting with Romeo and Juliet in the cafeteria.
I had just opened my locker and was digging around in the back, trying to find my compact mirror, when a deep voice coming from the other side of my locker door startled me.
“Hey.”
I swung the door closed and found myself face to face with Sam. He was leaning casually against the lockers, his hands jammed in his pockets. I blinked at him, then dropped the English textbook I was holding. It bounced off my backpack and hit me in the calf. I winced.
“Problem?” Sam asked, glancing down at the textbook and then back at me.
“No,” I said quickly.
Sam studied me and then smiled, the corners of his mouth creeping slowly upward like a stream of syrup spreading across a pancake. “You sure?” he asked.
“Positive.” I felt a little short of breath.
He bent down and picked up my backpack and my textbook in one smooth motion. “Here,” he said, handing them to me. “You might need these.”
“Thanks.” I stared at my feet, willing my face to stop flaming. What was wrong with me? I was reliable, mature Lacey Mann, who could be trusted to behave like a grown-up in any situation. And here I was acting like, well, Sydney.
“So.” Sam put his hands back in his pockets. His warm green eyes met mine. “What are you doing out here in the hallway? Shouldn’t you be eating with that friend of yours in the cafeteria? Jennica?”
“It’s no big deal,” I said. “She’s with her boyfriend. I just felt like walking around.”
“Guess you don’t want to watch her and her boyfriend all over each other,” he said.
I looked up sharply. “What? No. That’s not it.”
Sam looked like he didn’t believe me. “It would bother me.”
I paused. “Okay,” I admitted. “Maybe it bothers me a little.” I cleared my throat, suddenly desperate to change the subject. “So, um, your old school,” I said. “Where is it? I mean, where did you come from?”
“Taunton.”
“Oh,” I said. “I’ve been there.” It was about thirty minutes away.
“Oh yeah?”