THE FIRST DAY of senior year dawned hot and sticky, the way the beginning of every school year started. August in Alabama was a real beast, but there was something nice about it, the way that first blast of air-conditioning hit you when you walked into the school buildings, the way we were all still in summer clothes, the sharp scent of just-cut grass in the air.
This was the year I’d been looking forward to since I’d started school. The year I’d always dreamed that everything would happen for me. Another Homecoming crown, college acceptance letters, cheering at fall football games . . .
But as I made my way through that first day, I couldn’t escape the feeling of something missing. And of course, there was something missing. Or rather, someone.
Lord knew I’d spent a lot of time thinking of David lately. Once we’d gotten safely back to Pine Grove, once some of the shock of all that had happened had faded, I’d felt ashamed of how I’d left things in Tennessee. I should’ve gone back to the cave, shouldn’t have let my grief and my fear of seeing him lying there—really, truly dead—keep me from saying good-bye. From seeing him one more time.
But I was determined to put those thoughts out of my head. I had a senior year to ace and a school to run. It was time to turn my attentions back to those responsibilities.
The twins were in the parking lot, as usual, both in the same color—pink today—and while Amanda’s hair flowed loose over her shoulders, Abi’s had been chopped into a cute bob over the summer.
“I like!” I told her, gesturing to my own hair, and with a little shriek, she ran toward me, Amanda close behind. They both threw their arms around me, locking me in a hug that smelled like Clinique perfume and lavender. To my surprise, I almost teared up.
“Girl, we missed you!” Amanda said, and Abi nodded, nearly bumping the top of my head with her chin.
Before I’d left, the twins had been avoiding me, either from the weirdness last spring, or just because they hadn’t exactly been high up on my list of priorities, either.
The twins pulled back, watching me with identical hazel eyes, and then Abi frowned a little and said, “You’re going to help tutor me in AP Government, right? I have no idea why I signed up for that.”
Laughing, I nodded. “You got it.”
Leaving the two of them at the courtyard, I walked into the main building, waving at a couple of people—Lucy McCarroll; Bee’s ex, Brandon—and made my way toward the lockers.
Ryan and Bee were already waiting for me, and I rolled my eyes at them even as I smiled. “Y’all gonna walk me to class?”
“Yes,” Ryan said immediately, and Bee elbowed him in the ribs. “We were hoping not to be so obvious,” she said, moving her bag to her other arm, “but . . . okay, what he said.”
“You remember the part where I said that I really am okay, right?” I asked both of them, looking up into their faces. “How we had this whole moment when me and Bee got back, there at the Waffle Hut, and y’all were like, ‘Are you okay?’ and then I confirmed I was indeed okay, and we all said the word ‘okay’ so many times, it stopped sounding like a word? Remember all of that? It was quite a moment.”
Ryan reached out and, honest to God, ruffled my hair. “Hey!” I said, laughing a little as I stepped back. “We’re not dating anymore, but that doesn’t mean you get to treat me like your rapscallion cousin.”
“‘Rapscallion,’” Bee scoffed, and I gave a shrug, smoothing my hair back into place.
“Boning up on my SAT vocabulary,” I said, and she winced.
“Don’t say ‘boning.’”
All three of us laughed, and for a second, it was like nothing had changed. “I’ll meet you dorks for lunch,” I told them, “in the courtyard, usual table.”
After confirming that Bee and I did have our second-period class together, we headed off: Ryan and Bee to first-period Spanish, while I went in the opposite direction, heading for the headmaster’s office. As reigning SGA president, it was my responsibility to meet with any new students we might have this year in twelfth grade. I hadn’t heard of anyone, but then it wasn’t like I’d been focusing a huge amount on school stuff lately.
There was a flurry of activity around the main office, but that was always the way it was on the first day, and I was already thinking ahead to my own first-period class (AP French—at least half of my schedule was AP classes this year) when the office door opened and someone came hurrying out.
I was looking down as we collided, staring at the person’s shoes, a truly heinous pair of houndstooth Chucks, and wasn’t sure if my sharp inhale was from who those shoes reminded me of or the force of the collision. “Oh!” I gasped, my bag slipping off my arm.
I glanced down at it, only to find myself almost gasping again when I looked up.