“It seems like you’ve been having a lot of that,” I say.
“What do you mean?” Zach frowns.
“Time on your own. I’ve seen you, like, twice in two weeks?”
“I’ve been busy with school,” he says.
“I have school, too. And practice and a bunch of other things.”
Zach looks like he’s about to protest—he has two jobsandschool—but then his face softens. “You’re right. Sorry. What were you saying about trying Katy’s songs?”
“Maybe do something totally different,” I say, consciously letting the tension slip from my voice and body. I proceed a little more carefully now. “Like, horrodies are great and Ciano is brilliant, but maybe you could try something new?”
Zach takes a strand of my hair between his fingers. “You think so?”
“I do.”
I wrap my arms around his neck and stand on my tiptoes to kiss his chin.
“Sorry about my cigarette breath,” Zach says, looking into my eyes. And I shrug like it’s no big deal. Truthfully, I’ve started carrying perfume in my purse so I can spray myself after I’m with Zach to prevent my mom from asking questions. Not knowing that he smokes is not going to kill her.
“Maybe you’re right,” he says, slowly now, glancing above my head. “I just feel…stuck.”
I wrap my arms around his waist, and our chests heave in sync for a few moments before I put my hand in the back pocket of his jeans and promise, “I’m going to help you.” Then I muse, “How do we unstick you, Zach?”
AFTER
January
I can barely concentrate at school on Monday.
Between my continuing insomnia and my eventful weekend, my brain feels close to short-circuiting.
I am so restless, so ready for answers, that it takes everything I have not to tackle Katy for them when I see her. But the one thing I’m sure of, the one thing Iknow,is that I want answers on my own terms, so I don’t go to her.
She corners me before orchestra anyway, during the time when she would usually be socializing.
“Are you mad at me for calling your parents?” she asks, fiddling with the end of her French braid.
“No.”Yes. No.I don’t know if I care about my parents knowing I chose to have Zach removed from my mind. I care that I did it. That I made that choice. It makes me sick, makes me want to shake myself every time I look in the mirror.
“Well, then, can we talk?” Katy asks. More softly, she says, “I miss my best friend.”
I hesitate before nodding.
For the first time in recorded history, Katy and I skip orchestra and huddle in my car with the heater on.
“So what are you going to do?” she asks.
I tell her Caleb told me where Rory was buried and I want to work up the courage to go there soon. I tell her about today’s plan, too—to go to Meridian after school to find the real Zach. Katy’s not thrilled about it, but I think seeing him might bring it all back. It has to. At the very least, I’ll finally understand what happened between us, and I tell myself that knowing how and why might somehow fill up this giant hole that the truth has ripped in my life.
From the moment I got to school today, I’ve been second-guessing everything. Every weird look or strange conversation I’ve ever had with a person. Is there more I don’t remember? Is there something they know that I don’t?
Do I know somethingtheydon’t? I must have run into people at some point who have had Overton procedures before, too.
Do people at school know what I’ve done? The thought that they might—that they might have been whispering about me, gossiping about me all these years—is unbearable.
“Everything is so…”
