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chapter 3



The next morning is a total daze. My alarm goes off too late, and I roll out of bed only to find that school starts in just forty minutes. Just my luck.

I throw on a shirt, race down the stairs, and skid into the kitchen, armed with a glass of orange juice and a bowl of Lucky Charms. It’s a Monday, and I am exhausted. Harper and I spent the entire night emailing back and forth to each other, a conversation which started out about school and ended in making fun of celebrities at award shows and lusting for Girl Scout Cookies. I was too smiley while talking to her to sleep or even worry about how shitty I’d feel in the morning, so I guess this whole Curse of the Monday Fatigue thing I’m feeling is my fault. I swear, though, it was so worth it. Talking to Harper is always worth it.

Next I pull out a spoon from the drawer by the sink, hop up on the kitchen counter, and speed-eat my breakfast. Milk and cereal go flying everywhere and I’m sure I look like the breakfast equivalent of the Cookie Monster, but I don’t care. It’s not like the manner standards without Mom here are all that high.

My dad sits at the opposite end of the room. He eats his breakfast of toast and hardboiled eggs without meeting my gaze or so much as acknowledging my presence in the slightest. Dark circles rim his eyes, and even his glasses, which sit atop his thin nose, can’t hide the faint bloodshot tone to them. He’s been drinking again, I can tell. He’s always drinking nowadays.

After a second, a wave of nausea comes over me and I can’t look at him anymore, so I try to focus on something else in the room, anything but seeing his face. I shift my gaze to the refrigerator.

It’s white and peeling, with photos of Mom scattered all across it. I lean in, squinting a little. Some of them are older, fading pictures of Mom and Dad when they first met as teenagers, of them chasing each other on the beach post-college, and even snippets of their wedding where they’re smiling and hugging and looking so happy together—like a real couple. Like they used to be.

Then there are some pictures of me with her, me with dad, me with both of them. A drawing I made of Mom in second grade hangs in the corner of the refrigerator, depicting what’s really a stick figure with a straight line over her head that’s apparently supposed to symbolize hair, and beside it the note I wrote to her before I left for slumber camp for the first time, as well as a picture I took of Mom wearing shutter-shade glasses about a year ago, after she informed me she was going to become a hipster and “follow the teenage trends.” I laughed at her then and made fun of the insane poses she did with those glasses. I mean, she looked like a complete idiot, but she had no shame about it, either. And that’s what I miss—how she was her own person, how she never cared what anyone thought, only what she thought of herself.

I’m smiling now, but I’m not laughing with her anymore. Just like I have every day for the past six months, instantly, I regret taking her for granted. I regret just assuming she’d be there for me when I wake up in the morning, thinking she’d always be home cooking dinner for me and humming Elvis songs to herself since according to her, “Elvis is a god.” I regret not telling her how much she meant to me, how much I’d miss her, how devastated I’d be to see her go. If I could have one more second more with her, I would spend it whispering how much I love her into her ear and hugging her, just hugging her, and not letting go until she’s finally slipped away into nothing.

Most of all, I regret losing her. I regret letting her go without a fight, just like that. I don’t want to make those mistakes again. I don’t want to see anyone else leave, don’t want my heart to be ripped to shreds all over again.

I’m almost… afraid to love anyone else again. I want to be happy, and all love has done for me in life is stab me in the back.

After a while Dad looks up from his newspaper and glares at me from the kitchen table. I feel his gaze on me, and I sigh a little, pushing away the memories of Mom. I turn back to him, not wanting to look at him but not having the energy to fight it.

He looks terrible, as usual. Between his fading gray hair, his worn face, and the sad, empty look in his eyes, he looks so bad that I’m almost tempted to pity him. Hell, I would pity him, but after treating me and my mom like shit for the past year, the man is going to have to look a hell of lot worse to get any sympathy from me.

“Going to school?” Dad says, scowling.

This time, I don’t meet his gaze. I drop my spoon into my half-empty bowl of cereal, suddenly not hungry anymore. “Yes, Dad, it’s a Monday. That’s what normal people do on Mondays: they go to school. Or to work,” I add. There is nothing I dislike more than talking to him. Hearing his voice never fails to bring the taste of bile into my mouth, and all of my conversations with him seem to leave me nauseous. I hate my dad, hate how he ignores me, hate what he did to Mom and how he doesn’t even seem to care.

“Are you trying to say something about me?” he asks.

“No,” I say, hopping off the counter and moving toward the sink, bowl of cereal in hand. The spoon hangs from my mouth. “Of course not.”

He glares at me, but I ignore him. “I told you,” he says slowly, gritting his teeth. “I can’t get a job because I’m busy.”

“I can sure see that,” I say as I drop the bowl into the sink and turn on the hot water. “That newspaper has been keeping you busy for the last six months.”

“It’s just so riveting,” he spits.

I shake my head and ignore him, not wanting to engage any further. While the water is still running, I kick open the dishwasher and slip my bowl inside. Then I switch off the water, reach into the refrigerator to my left, and grab a ham sandwich lunch I prepared last night. In one single motion, I slip it into my bag and turn toward the door. “Well, I’m off to do something productive with my life. You should consider doing the same,” I say, then grab my backpack and walk out the door.

He doesn’t respond to that, but I can feel his glare on me as I walk down the front steps, into the driveway, and over to his old car he “lets me use.” I’m used to his looks by now, though. It’s been like this every morning since Mom’s death, so I know the drill.

It’s not that my dad’s abusive. He’s never laid a hand on me, and he most certainly isn’t ever going to. He’s not that kind of person; he barely even yells at me. He’s just in the background, a bitter nonfactor in my life. He makes me do it all alone, drinks his beer and makes snide remarks, and never does anything for me—but we don’t fight. That should be a good thing and maybe it is, but sometimes, I think his complete lack of caring is worse than fighting.

Fighting, at least, means I still matter to him.

Not caring doesn’t.

Right before I step into the car, I turn around. Through the foggy kitchen window, I meet his gaze and feel my throat catch. He just looks at me, his eyes hard, his lips curled.

***

I pull into the parking lot of my tiny high school a few minutes later and look around.

The school itself is only two buildings, a main one with two floors that are each divided up by subject and with a miniscule gym sitting behind the first. There is an athletic field surrounding the gym, but it’s the only field we have—depending on the season, it serves as the football field, the soccer field, the lacrosse field, and the field to every other sport students play here. The school is old, red-brick, and constantly surrounded by a thick mist, and as I step out of Dad’s car and walk up to the front entrance, the dew-covered grass wets my sneakers. The school is isolated atop a steep hill (known simply as “Hill Street”), like a special little sanctuary that achieves my one goal at the moment: to get away from the rest of the world.

Technically my school is a private school, but it costs almost nothing and teaches at just about the same pace as the local public high school. The only difference is this high school is much smaller, only about fifty kids per class, which is why my mom wanted to send me here. It isn’t a bad school, though. The kids are nice, even if I don’t really connect with them, and the work here is decently-challenging. Plus, the small class sizes and the fact that I rarely ever socialize with the other kids in town who don’t go here means no one knows about my vlog series.

A cool breeze brushes past me as I race up the steps to the school entrance. This early in the morning, the smell of moss is everywhere, probably from one of the trees surrounding the school.

It’s still too early to function beyond sleep-zombie status, I remind myself as I step inside, yawn, and make my way down to my locker. Cat’s is only a few away from mine, decorated on the inside with pictures of chocolate cake and pizza (it’s like she’s trying to kill me.) She nods at me as I approach. The faint scent of her vanilla shampoo fills my nose.

“Monday,” she says with fake enthusiasm and gives a small pump of her fist.

I grimace and quirk my eyebrow. “Fun times.” Then I turn, empty my backpack into my locker, and pull out my laptop. There are still a few minutes before class, so I lean against the wall, sit down, and scroll over to my vlog page. No new messages from Harper. My heart sinks.

Cat’s locker slams above me. “Well, I gotta get to Math,” she murmurs, grabs her backpack, and walks in the opposite direction down the hall. “Bye. Talk later?”

“See you,” I say without looking up. “And yeah, we’ll talk later.”

She disappears after that.

A few other kids trickle down the hall after me, grab books from their lockers, and head to class, but instead of following their lead I wait and focus in on my computer. The faint hum of the heater reverberates throughout the hallway, and it’s working so hard it smells like something is burning.

Next I check my email, hoping to find something new from Harper in my inbox. Sure enough, I am right. I grin a little as I click on it, already giddy to see what she has to say this time.

That’s what Harper does to me, though. She makes me feel so, so giddy.



from: Harper Knight <[email protected]>

to: Sam Green <[email protected]>

subject: your life just got better

So I got bored last night and taught myself how to make a GIF. So naturally, I made my first GIF to be of a cow. The result is pretttttty freaking awesome.



Then, she pastes a link. I click it immediately. A new window opens, and the next thing I know I’m staring at a GIF of a cow standing on top of a bike doing the disco with its hooves or whatever it is you call cow feet while also balancing a piece of pizza on its head.



Tumblr fame, Harper writes after the link, here I come.



I stifle a laugh. A girl from English spins around and shoots me a condescending, “WTF is wrong with you” stare, then continues fast-walking down the hallway. My face totally flushes. God, I must look like a total idiot, laughing in front of my computer on a Monday morning. I mean, seriously? Who does that? If only the girl knew I was talking to my internet girlfriend. Then she’d really think I was insane.

After another minute of staring at Harper’s GIF (to soak it in, of course) I type my response.



from: Sam Green <[email protected]>

to: Harper Knight <[email protected]>

subject: RE: your life just got better

That is either the most awesome or the most horrifying thing I’ve ever seen in my life. I can’t decide which.



Harper replies right away.



from: Harper Knight <[email protected]>

to: Sam Green <[email protected]>

subject: RE: RE: your life just got better

Both?



from: Sam Green <[email protected]>

to: Harper Knight <[email protected]>

subject: DON’T YOU GO TO SCHOOL?!?!

How did you respond so fast?!

…is someone anxious to talk to a certain charming and entirely attractive guy? ;-)



from: Harper Knight <[email protected]>

to: Sam Green <[email protected]>

subject: RE: DON’T YOU GO TO SCHOOL?!?!

Three things:

1) Yes, I go to school, and it is terrible, and that is okay.

2) That is such a lie. Get over yourself, Green.

3) There is something utterly terrifying about your use of the winky-face smiley.



from: Sam Green <[email protected]>

to: Harper Knight <[email protected]>

subject: RE: RE: DON’T YOU GO TO SCHOOL?!?!

1) Okay.



2) Please. I’m gorgeous.



3) ;-) ;-) ;-) ;-) ;-) ;-) ;-)





from: Harper Knight <[email protected]>

to: Sam Green <[email protected]>

subject: RE: RE: RE: DON’T YOU GO TO SCHOOL?!?!

Those winky-faces are making me shiver. I swear they’re going to kill me in the middle of the night and make me into a delicious winky-face stew.



from: Sam Green <[email protected]>

to: Harper Knight <[email protected]>

subject: They are.

In their defense, they make one mean smiley face stew. Especially with added Harper contents.



from: Harper Knight <[email protected]>

to: Sam Green <[email protected]>

subject: RE: They are.

You did NOT just imply that I’d make a good stew.



from: Sam Green <[email protected]>

to: Harper Knight <[email protected]>

subject: RE: RE: They are.

Oh, but Harper Knight, I totally did.



from: Harper Knight <[email protected]>

to: Sam Green <[email protected]>

subject: RE: RE: RE: They are.

Whatever. I am still more awesome than you.

Also, BTW, I wanted to talk to you about something. I’ll chat you through our chatroom…



I nod even though she can’t see me and glance at the time. My stomach drops. Oh shit. I’m a minute late to class already. I type my next email in a complete rush while grabbing my bag and rushing to my first class.



from: Sam Green <[email protected]>

to: Harper Knight <[email protected]>

subject: Sry

Actually i gotta go.. ttyl



As soon as I click send, I slam my computer shut, shove it into my backpack, and race down the hall to class, wondering all the way what Harper wanted to talk to me about it.