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“The biggest jerk in the history of all literature.” It’s nice to be agreeing on this point.
I put Harold down and move closer to him. I’m not going to need a purple crayon for what’s coming next.
“Love means never having to lose your limbs,” A tells me, leaning in.
“Exactly,” I say, kissing him.
No sacrifice. No pain. No requests.
Love. Just love.
I am lost in it. Enjoyably lost in it. At least until someone yells, “What do you think you’re doing?”
For a split second, I assume we’ve been caught by the librarian and are going to be fined. But the woman who’s yelling at me isn’t the librarian, or anyone else I’ve seen before. She’s an angry, middle-aged woman spitting out words. Getting all in my face, she says, “I don’t know who your parents are, but I did not raise my son to hang out with whores.”
I’m stunned. I haven’t done anything to deserve that.
“Mom!” A shouts. “Leave her alone.”
Mom. For a second, I think, This is A’s mother. Then I realize, no, it isn’t A’s mother. A doesn’t have a mother, not in the same sense that I have a mother. No, this must be the mother of the boy whose body he’s in. The one who homeschools him. The one who let him out to go to the library, and has found this.
“Get in the car, George,” she orders. “Right this minute.”
I am expecting A to give in. I will not blame him for giving in, even though I am feeling really attacked. But instead of giving in, A looks George’s mother in the eye and says, “Just. Calm. Down.”
Now it’s George’s mother who’s stunned. This innocent redheaded boy has probably never spoken to his mom like this before, although I have to imagine there have been plenty of times when she’s deserved it.
While George’s mother is thrown for a moment, A tells me we’ll find a way and he’ll talk to me later.
“You most certainly will not!” George’s mother proclaims.
I kiss him again. A kiss that’s hello and goodbye and good luck and I’ve had a great time all at once. I know these things are in there because I am putting them in there. Usually there are also questions in a kiss. Do you love me? Is this working? But this kiss is questionless.
“Don’t worry,” I whisper when the kiss is done. “We’ll figure out a way to be together. The weekend is coming up.”
I can’t say anything more than that, because George’s mother has grabbed his ear and has begun to pull. She looks at me again, trying to cut me down with her judgment—whore whore whore—but I don’t give up any ground. A laughs at how silly it is to be dragged away by his ear. This only makes her tug harder.
When they get outside, I wave. He can’t see me waving, but he waves back anyway.
—
It’s not even three o’clock. I check my phone and find a text from Justin asking me where I am, and then another saying he’s looked everywhere. I text back and tell him I wasn’t feeling well, and left school early. I know he won’t offer to bring me soup or check up on me, unless he wants to see if I’m lying.
So I turn off my phone. I disconnect.
If anyone asks, I’ll tell them I was sleeping.
And I’ll wait for A to wake me again.
Chapter Twenty-One
I spend Friday morning thinking about the weekend. This is not unusual—most people spend Friday thinking about the weekend. But most aren’t trying to find a place to meet someone like A.
I come up with a plan. My uncle has a hunting cabin he never uses—and right now he’s in California for work. My parents have a spare key they will never in a million years know is missing. All I need is an alibi. Or a few alibis.
I get an email from A saying he’s a girl named Surita today, and not that far away. I’m ready to drop school entirely—it’s Friday, after all—but A insists on meeting after sch
ool. I get it—there’s no real reason to screw over Surita. But maybe A is a little nicer about that than I would be.
