Thanks to everyone at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt for your faith and support. Thank you, Erin DeWitt, for your amazing eye and copyediting skills, and thanks to Lisa Vega and the design team for the gorgeous cover. It captures the feel of this book and these girls so beautifully. Nicole Sclama and Alexandra Primiani, thank you for always being so supportive and enthusiastic. I’m so glad to have you all in my corner!
Endless thanks to my critique-group girls: Lauren Thoman, Paige Crutcher, and Sarah Brown. This book would not be what it is without your early reads and insights and passion. I would not be who I am without your friendship and humor and support. I’m so happy to have discovered pizza fries with you ladies. To my beta readers and first readers, Dahlia Adler, Anna-Marie McLemore, Tristina Wright, Jenn Fitzpatrick, Nita Tyndall, Sara Taylor Woods, and Tehlor Kinney, thank you so much for giving your time, your thoughts, and your excitement to this book. Because of you, I am overwhelmingly thrilled to put this story into the hands of readers who may need it. I can’t thank you enough for talking Grace and Eva thro?ugh with me. I can’t thank you enough for talking me through with me. I adore you all.
Thanks to Destiny Cole and your constant support and insights on this book. So happy to continue on this journey with you.
Thank you, Ami Allen-Vath, for the last minute-fact checks and enthusiasm. I’m so thankful to have you in my life. Love you, girl.
Thanks to Tess Sharpe, for your enthusiasm and excitement over this book. I found myself inside the pages of Far From You for the first time, and it means so much to me to be able to share this book with you.
Thanks to Sarah Crowe, for sharing part of your story with me.
To my Nashville community of amazing people: Courtney Stevens, Lauren Thoman, Paige Crutcher, Sarah Brown, Victoria Schwab, Carla Schooler, Christa Lafontaine, Kristin Tubb, Erica Rogers, Alisha Klapheke, Rae Ann Parker, Kathryn Ormsbee, and Jeff Zentner, I am in constant awe of your friendship and support. I could not ask for better friends, and if I could, I’d ask for each and every one of you ten times over.
Jen Gaska, you continue to amaze me with your love and friendship, your faith in me, and your infectious optimism. Thank you for being my pal and for being a safe space.
Becky Albertalli, who is probably the kindest person I know. Thank you for your friendship and constant support for my writing.
Thank you to Parnassus Books and Stephanie Appell for being the best indie bookstore and advocate for children’s books a writer could hope for. I am so proud to call this store home.
Dahlia Adler, for her tireless book-and-young-adult advocacy and all the work she does over at LGBTQReads.com.
Thank you to all the bloggers who have shown interest, lent support, and worked to help my little book find the readers who need it.
Thank you to all the Blakes, Herrings, Cowns, Stricklands, Popes, Timmons, and Todds, for loving me the way only a family can.
Benjamin and William, my beautiful boys, thank you for helping me love just as freely and wildly as you do.
Thank you, Craig, for being my partner, for loving me where I am and encouraging me to follow my dreams.?
Chapter One
Hadley
His hand is warm on my bare back. Soothing. I bite the inside of my cheek to stop myself from leaning into it. Perched on the edge of the bed, I squint through the darkness and spot my shirt on the floor over the air vent, billowing up like a sheet drying in the wind. I slip it over my head and shiver, the cotton icy against my skin. His hand and the warmth vanish, along with any desire I had to remain in this room for longer than it’ll take me to get from the bed to the door.
“Are you sure you don’t want to stay a little longer?” Josh asks as I stand up. He props himself up on his elbows, his long body still sprawled across the bed. Party sounds filter upstairs and under the closed door, the steady unst, unst of the music pumping its way through beer-thick laughter.
In response, I toss him his shirt, straighten my still-buttoned jeans, smooth my hair.
“C’mon, Hadley.” His words blend into a soft slur as he drapes his shirt over his lap.
I crack open the door. “So, um, this was fun . . .” My voice trails off as the hallway light blazes into my eyes, bringing me back to reality.
“Hello? Name’s Josh. I’m in your English class.”
I turn to face him, his close-cropped hair coated bronze in the dim light. He tilts his head at me, his full mouth open a little, like he really can’t believe that I’m going to leave him here, half-naked and blue-balled. I force my lips into a smile. The one that pulled him toward me from across the room an hour earlier and had him whispering into my hair within ten minutes of hello.
“I know your name.”
And then I leave.
Alone in the hallway, I press my back against the door, my fingers gripping the handle, and close my eyes. I take a deep breath and wait for all the pleasantly blurred lines to sharpen again. I can still feel his fingers on my face, caressing it like he actually cared. Like I actually cared. As always, it’s a nice illusion. A break from the normal chaos going on in my head. I know it’ll all come rushing back later, when I’m lying in my bed, staring through the dark at the ceiling in my perpetually silent house, but for now, it’s nice to feel a hint of calm.
Down the hall, the bathroom door opens and Sloane Waters steps out in a denim skirt and a white top so sheer I can see the lace edging of her black bra. She freezes when she spots me, her top lip curling as if she smells something bad. Sloane had it in for me before I even officially met her. At her infamous back-to-school party a month ago, I made out with Isaac Jorgenson. Granted, Isaac was her ex and we might have ended up in her bedroom, but they broke up a year ago and she’s dated half the football team since then.
Sloane’s narrowed eyes roam over my rumpled hair and wrinkled shirt. I feel my cheeks warm, but I pull my expression into one of indifference and brush past her. She’s mercifully and unusually silent. As I pass, I get a whiff of her grape bubblegum smell, so cloying I nearly gag.
Downstairs, I swim through the sea of writhing bodies and into the living room of some guy whose name I can’t even remember. The music is so loud that I feel like it’s coming from inside my skull. Despite the crowd, Kat manages to find me seconds after I surface.
“So?” she asks. Her breath smells like orange Tic-Tacs. She slips a blue plastic cup into my hands.
“No, thanks.” I push the cup away, but she shoves it back with an eye roll.
“Lighten up. I’m not trying to get you drunk so I can have my way with you. It’s just water.”
I pinch her arm and she swats at me. The water is cool and clean and washes away Josh’s lingering taste of beer and spearmint gum. We make our way to the edge of the huge living room where it opens up into the kitchen. I lean against the wall and drain my cup, my heart rate finally slowing after having Josh’s lips on my neck.