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“Iknow weekends are typically free of volunteering,” Mom began Saturday morning while I ate, dragging my spoon through my oatmeal. I’d added blueberries and granola on top, and I watched as it all blended together. Nellie, who sat at the breakfast table across from me, listened quietly while she ate her pancakes. Jamie hadn’t come down from his room yet. “But you need to do something tonight.”
My first instinct was to straighten my shoulders and be quick to obey. Like second nature, I wanted to jump and please her. So, it took an internal fight to not raise my eyes, to focus on the oats in front of me. She saidtonight, which meant no Crushed Beanz. That alone irritated everything in me. “Like what?”
“Mrs. Conan needs someone to accompany Grace to an event tonight,” Mom explained. “She mentioned it yesterday. I—well, you know why I jumped to volunteer you.”
I scooped a blueberry onto my spoon, and before I put it in my mouth, I said, “Because she’s your boss?”
“Because you’re responsible,” she corrected. “You have a level head on your shoulders. That attitude, though—”
“It wasn’t attitude.” My words were obviously contradictory of the situation, however. I cut her off. I obviously asked for death.
Nellie seemed to think the same thing, her fork frozen on a chunk of pancake.
“What kind of event?” I asked, deciding to plow past the moment. I took another bite of oatmeal, popping a blueberry. “Do I have to wear a dress?”
“It’s some concert over in Hallow she wants to go to. So, no, probably not a dress.”
My spoon clattered in against my bowl. Whoa, wait. Wait, wait, wait. A concert. In Hallow.
No way.
“It’s at a coffee shop. Crushed Beanz, Mrs. Conan said. It starts at eight, so pick Grace up around seven-thirty.”
I stared at Mom for a long moment, just breathing. My thoughts flew past me too rapidly for me to think anything through. “Coffee shop,” I echoed. “Crushed Beanz.”
“Can I go?” Nellie piped up for the first time in the entire conversation. “I’ve never been to a concert before.”
“Maybe when you’re older,” Mom returned, voice firm. It kept Nellie from begging for an exception. Instead, she merely returned to cutting her pancake.
It slowly sunk in. I had to take Grace to Crushed Beanz tonight. I would listen to Untapped Potential tonight, but asDestelle. Curly-haired, Claire-Haute, heeled-boot-wearing Destelle.
“You know, I’m not feeling that great, Mom. Maybe I—”
“Don’t do that,” she ordered, her words like a slap on the wrist. “Don’t lie. I’ve raised you better than that.”
She had, of course. I should’ve thought through my response before blurting it out, should’ve waited until later in the evening to be “sick.” Thinking had become difficult in my frazzled brain, and I just blurted the first thing that came to mind.
I abruptly swiped up my bowl, carrying it to the sink. “Seven-thirty,” I told Mom, clearing my throat to erase the tension in my voice. “All right.”
“You’ll have a nice time, I’m sure,” Mom said, opening the fridge and retrieving a jug of orange juice. “Maybe they’ll end up being your next favorite band.”
I made a little noise in acknowledgment, but it almost sounded like a whimper of fear.
I took the stairs two steps at a time, pulse pounding. At breakfast, Mom had already passed my phone back for the morning, but I needed to be in the privacy of my bedroom and call Margot. She would have advice for me. She’d talk me off my ledge.
When I got to my room, I found Jamie on the floor in front of my bed, little hands reaching underneath. “Hey!” My heart jumped in my throat at the thought of the shoebox underneath the bed, my panic ratcheting higher. “What do you think you’re doing?”
Jamie jerked his hands back as if he’d been burned and turned to me, surprised. I couldn’t tell if it was because I shouted or because he saw the shoebox.
“My bouncy ball rolled under your bed,” he said quickly, holding a neon ball in his hand. “I was getting it.”
“Ask next time, okay?” I told him, practically shoving him out of my bedroom.
Jamie stumbled over the threshold, and I shut the door in his face. My hands shook as I slumped against the wood, hands shaking. I didn’t hear Jamie’s footsteps retreat, but I heard Dad’s voice faintly through the door, asking if everything was okay.
Lunging forward, I fell to my knees in front of my bed and reached underneath, swiping my palms along the dusty space. My fingertips brushed the box, pushed so far back that Jamie’s little arms wouldn’t have reached. Or at least I didn’t think they would. For good measure, I pulled the box out and took off the lid, analyzing the contents.
The online college brochures were in disarray, still on top. I sifted further, finding my black turtleneck and leggings next, as well as a rolled up black T-shirt. The Stella silk bag sat underneath that, and after a quick check, I found it still in there. Just the way I’d left it. Jamie hadn’t touched any of this.
