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“I get it, okay?” I say, looking out the window. “Can we just go back to school?”
He clenches his jaw and starts the car.
Barely anyone’s around when Sean drops me off by the main entrance. Without words, he pulls away—he’ll go to the student lot to park. I rush inside, feeling sick about our first fight, particularly because I know I’m the one who’s wrong.
I shove my way through the swarm of students buzzing through the main hall. For the billionth time since we started at Woodbury, I wish that our assigned locker were in one of the less congested areas of the school. Sighing after someone elbows me in the back as she passes, I rush through the combination—3, 33, 13—wanting to just stash my books, get what I need for Spanish, and get out of here.
Dave makes sure that doesn’t happen.
Usually, I don’t see Dave at school, which is a good thing. Despite all of us knowing that he can’t tell us apart, Ella still seems happy to be dating him, and even Betsey said he was funny after they went out for coffee when he just showed up as a surprise after night class. I’m the only one who’s emotionally allergic to the guy. Which is, of course, why I’m the one he asks to the Halloween Dance today, of all days.
In the most humiliatingly public way possible.
I yank open the locker door and dozens and dozens of tennis balls come spilling out all over the main hall. The girl at the locker next to mine squeals and points at the ball avalanche, drawing even more attention to me and the situation. Since the hallway’s so packed, everyone has to dodge the furry balls or risk tripping and falling: I get a seriously scary look when a girl wearing inappropriately tall heels nearly breaks her ankle trying to make it through the mess.
Almost in the same instant, I realize three things: Three of the balls are pink with words written on them; Dave and his friends are watching nearby; and approaching from the other direction is none other than Sean.
My real boyfriend.
The one who’s already super mad at me right now.
Grayson and a girl I don’t know are standing by their shared locker across the walkway. I look at Grayson, pleading with my eyes. Despite the fact that she probably still thinks I’m a liar, she smiles warmly and weaves through the crowd, bending to pick up balls as she approaches. By the time she makes it to my side of the hall, she’s got an armload.
“Lily, will you go get a bag from the office?” Grayson calls over her shoulder.
“Sure,” Lily says, slamming the locker and disappearing into the sea of people. I glance at Dave and catch one of his friends elbowing him on the arm in congratulations. It’s annoying. Meanwhile, people continue to stare and laugh at the locker that vomited tennis balls and the girl desperately trying to contain them.
Whatever this is, it is not romantic.
“Thanks,” I say to Grayson. “Guess he likes grand gestures.” I nod toward Dave.
“Guess so,” she says with a little laugh. Since the whole look-alike-cousin thing, there’s been an invisible wedge between us, and it’s not like we knew each other that well before.
“Aren’t you going to read it?” she asks, pointing to a pink ball, then shifting to catch a yellow one that’s trying to jump out of her arms.
“Oh, right,” I say. One of the balls with a message written on it is right next to my left foot; I pick it up.
DAVE? is scrawled in black Sharpie across the fuzzy surface. Confused, I look through legs and feet for the other two. I see familiar shoes stop right next to me; Sean speaks.
“Looking for this?” he asks, holding out a pink tennis ball, the word DANCE written on it. Sean’s face is neutral for the sake of the crowd, but his eyes are seething. And I get it: We just battled over my mom and now he’s watching me get asked to a dance by another guy in front of the entire school.
I take the ball and glance at Dave, whose chest is puffed up like a rooster’s. Sean follows my line of sight and shakes his head ever so slightly, then keeps moving down the hall toward his class. I want to chase after him, but I’m frozen. Thankfully, the warning bell rings, so the crowd thins. Grayson’s locker mate, Lily, reappears with a massive garbage bag, and the three of us spend the remaining time gathering tennis balls.
“Thanks for your help, you guys,” I say as I lean over to grab the last one.
“It’s no big deal,” Lily says, nodding to the bag. “Where do you want to put that?”
“I’ll drop it off in the gym. I’m sure they can use them.”
“Probably not this one,” Grayson says, handing me the pink tennis ball that says WITH.
DANCE WITH DAVE?
As the final bell rings, I look over to where he was standing: He’s gone. He made me, Grayson, and Lily late to class, but he didn’t even stick around long enough to get my answer. God forbid he’d be late, too.
It was a gesture for the crowd that watched, not for Elizabeth Best.
Not for Ella.
