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Work with Mr. Manning or lose my childhood home?
Mom and Lindsey had switched to talking about Lindsey’s kids, and my legs carried me to my bedroom before I knew what was happening. My mind was whirling, but everything else felt numb, like I’d crossed into dreamland. The unthinkable—but it wasn’t anymore. Mom thought about it. I just had to keep her from pulling the trigger.
I’d figure it out. I’d have to.
I flipped off my overhead light, letting my night light illuminate the room. I walked over to my window next, ready to pull my thick curtains together.
As I clenched the fabric, my gaze snagged on movement across the street. The Manning’s front door eased open, revealing the object of my incessant thoughts as Reed crept out onto the front porch. He had on dark clothes but wore a pair of his brightest sneakers, and the reflectors on them caught in the lamplight. For a wild second, I thought he was going to cross the street and come to my house, but Reed only ducked his head and started off down the sidewalk.
I watched him until he moved out of view, and even then, I debated pulling on a pair of sweatpants and following after him. Where was he going so late on a school night? I wracked my brain, but the possibilities offered more questions than answers.
Even though we were supposed to be working on our worksheets in the last ten minutes of Physics, I sat at my blacktopped desk and fiddled with my fingers. I could never focus in class. It was the second to last class of the day, which meant my brain was ready to check out, and there were too many distractions. Florencia Rodrigo gossiping with Devin Lepper at the table behind us, for example. The fact that Mr. Pieffer was playingGalagaon his computer, with the sound on. And then there was Reed, who sat two rows behind me. Who, I was trying to convince myself, wasn’t staring at my shoulders, though it felt like it.
Attempting to focus was useless.
I also had to fight the urge to pull out my cell and check my inbox. Even though Mr. Pieffer was playing his own computer games, he wasn’t too hip on students using their phones in class. He was one of the few teachers who actually enforced the rule.
Rachel was being the dutiful student and going through her worksheet, and I distracted myself by watching her write out an answer on her worksheet. She held her pencil loosely in her left hand, angling so she wouldn’t drag her palm against the graphite. She was lefthanded—was Reed lefthanded too?
Stop, I scolded myself and the way my thoughts casually drifted to the wrong twin. But looking at Rachel now, I couldn’t help but imagine how the conversation might’ve gone if I told her the truth.The other night, I asked your brother to be my first kiss, and he said yes. And, well—it wasreallygood. Are first kisses supposed to be that good?
If Rachel didn’t stab me with her pencil, I’d be surprised.
It wasn’t the threat of violence that kept me quiet. The longer I kept it to myself, the more I could play it over and over in my mind and no one would have any clue.
“So, have you seen your dad’s apartment yet?” Rachel asked after a moment, cutting off my train of eye-stabbing thought. “Hopefully he’s at the nice complex with the elevator.”
“I haven’t been yet.” The day they’d announced the separation was fresh in my mind, even though it happened weeks ago. The way they’d delivered the news had been flat, emotionless, like they were talking about splitting the last cookie instead of splitting up. The wordsmoving outandapartmenthad lost their meaning. “I think he wants to surprise me. Surprises are what they do best.”
“You mean about the divorce? Hey, at least your dad didn’t cheat on your mom with some woman from Jefferson.”
Once more, I fell silent, watching her work. At first, I thought the sudden mention was because somehow, she found out about yesterday, with her dad finding me at the coffee shop. But when she didn’t follow up, I realized that was her response to me talking about the divorce.
When I’d first told Rachel about my parents’ separation, that’d been her response nearly word for word.At least your dad didn’t cheat.As if that somehow made the prospect of my parents falling out of love more bearable. As if it made the fact Mom cried herself to sleep less heartbreaking.
“I’m still surprised he came clean about it, you know,” Rachel went on, but her voice sounded different. Stiffer. “My dad, I mean. And like you can’t believe your dad got a new place? I can’t believe mine ruined our whole family.”
I thought of Mr. Manning’s sad expression from the café yesterday, and with the thought came the ugly confliction. Whenever Rachel looked at me like that, my stomach twisted painfully. “I, uh, I had someone reach out for another website design.”
“Look at you, my techy best friend.” Rachel beamed, and just like that, the conversation was once more in neutral territory. I wasn’t so easily put at ease, given the new topic I shifted to. “You should start a business and Maisie can be your math financial person.”
I snorted at the clunky title, but it sounded off-key. “I feel a little weird about doing it.”
Rachel didn’t look up at me, but I could tell she was interested in the way she tipped her head closer. “Why not?”
I chewed on the inside of my cheek, watching as she began flipping through her Physics textbook. “Uh, the job is kind of big. Bigger than I’ve ever done before.” It wasn’t a blatant lie, but the way I danced around the truth made me uneasy.
She lifted her head to peer at me. “Do I know them?”
I wedged my fingers underneath my legs, pinning them to the seat, forcing them still. There was no dodging this one now—it was either tell the truth or tell a lie.
“Hey.” Two hands suddenly appeared on the blacktop table, and I traced the arms up to find Reed leaning over me, his gaze on his sister. He kept his voice low, letting it mix in with the murmuring of other students. “Quit gossiping, yeah? I can hear you two tables back.”
His hands were inches from where mine rested on the table, his arm close enough to my face that I could see the freckles dotting his skin. And don’t get me started on the way hesmelled. Jasmine and green apple. Clean, sharp, intoxicating.
Stop smelling him!
“Mind your own business,” Rachel told him. “Everyone else is.”
