LYNN PAINTER

SIMON S HUSTER

NEW YORK LONDON TORONTO SYD N EY NEW DELH I

For my amazing mom, who’s always been my

biggest fan, harshest critic, and the woman

single-handedly responsible for my distrust of

those asshats in the shoe industry. Thank you

for letting me read under the blankets when I

should’ve been sleeping.

And for my beloved dad, who saw the cover but

never got to read the book. He would’ve loved

the Stella’s scene and remembered the ketchup.

RIP, Jerry Painter (5/17/39–5/18/20)

—L. P.

PROLOGUE

“I’m just a girl, standing in front of a

boy, asking him to love her.”

— Notting Hill

My mother taught me the golden rule of dating before I even hit the second grade.

At the ripe age of seven, I’d snuck into her room after having a nightmare. (A house-size cricket might not sound scary, but when it speaks in a robot voice and knows your middle name, it is terrifying.) Bridget Jones’s Diary was playing on the boxy television on top of the dresser, and I’d watched a good portion of the movie before she even noticed me at the foot of her bed. At that point, it was too late to rescue me from the so-not-1rst-grade-friendly content, so she snuggled up beside me, and we watched the happy ending together.

But my 1rst-grade brain just couldn’t compute. Why would Bridget give up the cuter one—the charming one—for the person who was the equivalent of one ginormous yawn? How did that even make sense?

Yep—I’d missed the movie’s point completely and had fallen madly in love with the playboy. And to this day, I can still hear my mom’s voice and smell the vanilla of her perfume as she played with my hair and set me straight.

“Charm and intrigue can only get you so far, Libby Loo. Those things always disappear, which is why you never, ever choose the bad boy.”

After that, we shared hundreds of similar moments, exploring life together through romantic movies. It was our thing. We’d snack-up, kick back on the pillows, and binge-watch from her collection of kiss-infused happy endings like other people binge-watched trashy reality TV.

Which, in hindsight, is probably why I’ve been waiting for the perfect romance since I was old enough to spell the word “love.”

And when she died, my mother bequeathed to me her unwavering belief in happily ever after. My inheritance was the knowledge that love is always in the air, always a possibility, and always worth it.

Mr. Right—the nice-guy, dependable version—could be waiting around the very next corner.

Which was why I was always at the ready.

It was only a matter of time before it 1nally happened for me.

CHAPTER ONE

“Nobody finds their soul mate when

they’re ten. I mean, where’s the fun in

that, right?”

— Sweet Home Alabama

The day began like any typical day.

Mr. Fitzpervert left a hair ball in my slipper, I burned my earlobe with the straightener, and when I opened the door to leave for school, I caught my next-door nemesis suspiciously sprawled across the hood of my car.

“Hey!” I slid my sunglasses up my nose, pulled the front door shut behind me, and hightailed it in his direction, careful not to scuP my pretty new Aoral Aats as I basically ran at him. “Get oP of my car.”

Wes jumped down and held up his hands in the universal I’m innocent pose, even though his smirk made him look anything but. Besides, I’d known him since kindergarten; the boy had never been innocent a day in his life.

“What’s in your hand?”

“Nothing.” He put the hand in question behind his back. Even though he’d gotten tall and mannish and a tiny bit hot since grade school, Wes was still the same immature boy who’d “accidentally” burned down my mom’s rosebush with a 1recracker.

“You’re so paranoid,” he said.

I stopped in front of him and squinted up at his face. Wes had one of those naughty-boy faces, the kind of face where his dark eyes—surrounded by mile-long thick lashes because life wasn’t fair—spoke volumes, even when his mouth said nothing.

An eyebrow raise told me just how ridiculous he thought I was. From our many less-than-pleasant encounters, I knew the narrowing of his eyes meant he was sizing me up, and that we were about to throw down about the most recent

annoyance he’d brought upon me. And when he was bright-eyed like he was right now, his brown eyes practically freaking twinkling with mischief, I knew I was screwed. Because mischievous Wes always won.

I poked him in the chest. “What did you do to my car?”

“I didn’t do anything to your car, per se.”

“Per se?”

“Whoa. Watch your 1lthy mouth, Buxbaum.”

I rolled my eyes, which made his mouth slide into a wicked grin before he said, “This has been fun, and I love your granny shoes, by the way, but I’ve gotta run.”

“Wes—”

He turned and walked away from me like I hadn’t been speaking. Just…

walked toward his house in that relaxed, overcon1dent way of his. When he got to the porch, he opened the screen door and yelled to me over his shoulder,

“Have a good day, Liz!”

Well, that couldn’t be good.

Because there was no way he legitimately wanted me to have a good day. I glanced down at my car, apprehensive about even opening the door.

See, Wes Bennett and I were enemies in a no-holds-barred, full-on war over the one available parking spot on our end of the street. He usually won, but only because he was a dirty cheater. He thought it was funny to reserve the Spot for himself by leaving things in the space that I wasn’t strong enough to move. Iron picnic table, truck motor, monster truck wheels. You get it.

(Even though his antics caught the attention of the neighborhood Facebook page—my dad was a group member—and the old gossips frothed with rage at their keyboards over the blights on the neighborhood landscape, not a single person had ever said anything to him or made him stop. How was that even fair?)

But I was the one riding the victory wave for once, because yesterday I’d had the brilliant idea to call the city after he’d decided to leave his car in the Spot for three days in a row. Omaha had a twenty-four-hour ordinance, so good old Wesley had earned himself a nice little parking ticket.

Not going to lie, I did a little happy dance in my kitchen when I saw the deputy slide that ticket underneath Wes’s windshield wiper.

I checked all four tires before climbing into my car and buckling my seat belt.

I heard Wes laugh, and when I leaned down to glare at him out the passenger window, his front door slammed shut.

Then I saw what he’d found so funny.

The parking ticket was now on my car, stuck to the middle of the windshield with clear packing tape that was impossible to see through. Layers and layers of what appeared to be commercialgrade packing tape.

I got out of the car and tried to pry up a corner with my 1ngernail, but the edges had all been solidly Aattened down.

What a tool.

When I 1nally made it to school after scraping my windshield with a razor blade and doing hard-core deep breathing to reclaim my zen, I entered the building with the Bridget Jones’s Diary soundtrack playing through my headphones. I’d watched the movie the night before—for the thousandth time in my life—but this time the soundtrack had just spoken to me. Mark Darcy saying Oh, yes, they fucking do while kissing Bridget was, of course, as swoony as hell1re, but it wouldn’t have been so oh-my-God- worthy if not for Van Morrison’s “Someone Like You” playing in the background.

Yeah—I have a nerd-level fascination with movie soundtracks.

That song came on as I went past the commons and made my way through the crowds of students clogging up the halls. My favorite thing about music—

when you played it loud enough through good headphones (and I had the best)

—was that it softened the edges of the world. Van Morrison’s voice made swimming upstream in the busy hallway seem like it was a scene from a movie, as opposed to the royal pain that it actually was.

I headed toward the second-Aoor bathroom, where I met Jocelyn every morning. My best friend was a perpetual oversleeper, so there was rarely a day when she wasn’t scrambling to put on her eyeliner before the bell rang.

“Liz, I love that dress.” Joss threw me a side-glance between cleaning up each eye with a cotton swab as we walked into the bathroom. She pulled out a tube of mascara and began swiping the wand over her lashes. “The Aowers are so you.”

“Thanks!” I went over to the mirror and did a turn to make sure the vintage A-line dress wasn’t stuck in my underwear or something equally embarrassing.

Two cheerleaders surrounded by a puP of white cloud were vaping behind us, and I gave them a closed-mouth smile.

“Do you try to dress like the leads in your movies, or is it a coincidence?” Joss asked.

“Don’t say ‘your movies’ like I’m addicted to porn or something.”

“You know what I mean,” Joss said as she separated her lashes with a safety pin.

I knew exactly what she meant. I watched my mom’s beloved rom-coms practically every night, using her DVD collection I’d inherited when she died. I felt closer to my mother when I watched them; it felt like a tiny piece of her was there, watching beside me. Probably because we’d watched them together So.

Many. Times.

But Jocelyn didn’t know any of that. We’d grown up on the same street but hadn’t become actual good friends until sophomore year, so even though she knew my mom had died when I was in 1fth grade, we’d never really talked about it. She’d always assumed I was obsessed with love because I was hopelessly romantic. I never corrected her.

“Hey, did you ask your dad about the senior picnic?” Joss looked at me in the mirror, and I knew she was going to be irritated. Honestly, I was surprised that wasn’t the 1rst thing she asked me when I walked in.

“He wasn’t home last night until after I went to bed.” It was the truth, but I could’ve asked Helena, if I’d really wanted to discuss it. “I’ll talk to him today.”

“Sure you will.” She twisted the mascara closed and shoved it into her makeup bag.

“I will. I promise.”

“Come on.” Jocelyn stuck her makeup bag into her backpack and grabbed her coPee. “I can’t be tardy to Lit again or I’ll get detention, and I told Kate I’d drop gum by her locker on the way.”

I adjusted the messenger bag on my shoulder and caught a glimpse of my face in the mirror. “Wait—I forgot lipstick.”

“We don’t have time for lipstick.”

“There’s always time for lipstick.” I unzipped the side pouch and pulled out my new fave, Retrograde Red. On the oP chance (so very oP chance) my McDreamy was in the building, I wanted good mouth. “You go ahead.”

She left and I rubbed the color over my lips. Much better. I tucked the lipstick back into my bag, replaced my headphones, and exited the restroom, hitting play and letting the rest of the Bridget Jones soundtrack wrap itself around my psyche.

When I got to English Lit, I walked to the back of the room and took a seat at the desk between Joss and Laney Morgan, sliding my headphones down to my neck.

“What did you put for number eight?” Jocelyn was writing fast while she talked to me, 1nishing her homework. “I forgot about the reading, so I have no idea why Gatsby’s shirts made Daisy cry.”

I pulled out my worksheet and let Joss copy my answer, but my eyes shifted over to Laney. If surveyed, everyone on the planet would unanimously agree that the girl was beautiful; it was an indisputable fact. She had one of those noses that was so adorable, its existence had surely created the need for the word “pert.”

Her eyes were huge like a Disney princess’s, and her blond hair was always shiny and soft and looked like it belonged in a shampoo commercial. Too bad her soul was the exact opposite of her physical appearance.

I disliked her so very much.

On the 1rst day of kindergarten, she’d yelled Ewwww when I’d gotten a bloody nose, pointing at my face until the entire class gawked at me in disgust.

In third grade, she’d told Dave Addleman that my notebook was full of love notes about him. (She’d been right, but that wasn’t the point.) Laney had blabbed to him, and instead of being sweet or charming like the movies had led me to believe he’d be, David had called me a weirdo. And in 1fth grade, not long after my mom had died and I’d been forced to sit by Laney in the lunchroom due to assigned seating, every day as I picked at my barely edible hot lunch, she

would unzip her pastel pink lunchbox and wow the entire table with the delights her mother had made just for her.

Sandwiches cut into adorable shapes, homemade cookies, brownies with sprinkles; it had been a treasure trove of kiddie culinary masterpieces, each one more lovingly prepared than the last.

But the notes were what had destroyed me.

There wasn’t a single day that her lunch didn’t include a handwritten note from her mom. They were funny little letters that Laney used to read out loud to her friends, with silly drawings in the margins, and if I allowed my snooping eyes to stray to the bottom, where it said “Love, Mom” in curly cursive with doodled hearts around it, I would get so sad that I couldn’t even eat.

To this day, everyone thought Laney was great and pretty and smart, but I knew the truth. She might pretend to be nice, but for as long as I could remember, she’d given me crusty-weird looks. As in every single time the girl looked at me, it was like I had something on my face and she couldn’t decide if she was grossed-out or amused. She was rotting under all that beauty, and someday the rest of the world would see what I saw.

“Gum?” Laney held out a pack of Doublemint with her perfectly arched eyebrows raised.

“No, thanks,” I muttered, and turned my attention to the front of the room as Mrs. Adams came in and asked for homework. We passed our papers forward, and she started talking about literary things. Everyone began taking notes on their school-issued laptops, and Colton Sparks gave me a chin nod from his desk in the corner.

I smiled and looked down at my computer. Colton was nice. I’d talked to him for a solid two weeks at the beginning of the year, but that had turned out to be meh. Which kind of summed up the whole of my collective dating history, actually: meh.

Two weeks—that was the average length of my relationships, if you could even call them that.

Here’s how it usually went: I would see a cute guy, daydream about him for weeks and totally build him up in my mind to be my one-and-only soul mate.

The usual high school pre-relationship stuP always began with the greatest of

hopes. But by the end of two weeks, before we even got close to official, I almost always got hit with the Ick. The death sentence to all blossoming relationships.

Definition of the Ick: A dating term that refers to a sudden cringe feeling one gets when they have romantic contact with someone and they become almost immediately put off by them.

Joss said I was always browsing but never buying. And she ended up being right. But my propensity for tiny little two-week relationships really messed with prom potential. I wanted to go with someone who made my breath catch and my heart Autter, but who was even left in the school that I hadn’t already considered?

I mean, technically, I had a prom date; I was going with Joss. It’s just… going to prom with my best friend felt like such a fail. I knew we’d have a good time—

we were grabbing dinner beforehand with Kate and Cassidy, the funnest of our little friend group—but prom was supposed to be the pinnacle of high school romance. It was supposed to be poster-board promposals, matching corsages, speechless awe over the way you look in your dress, and sweet kisses under the cheesy disco ball.

Andrew McCarthy and Molly Ringwald Pretty in Pink sort of shit.

It wasn’t about friends grabbing dinner at the Cheesecake Factory before heading up to the high school for awkward conversation while the coupled-oP

couples found their way to the infamous grinding wall.

I knew Jocelyn wouldn’t get it. She thought prom was no big deal, just a high school dance that you dressed up for, and she would 1nd me completely ridiculous if I admitted to being disappointed. She was already peeved by the fact that I kept blowing her oP on dress shopping, but I never felt like going.

At all.

My phone buzzed.

Joss: I have BIG tea.

I looked over at her, but she appeared to be listening to Mrs. Adams. I glanced at the teacher before responding: Spill it.

Joss: FYI I got it via text from Kate.

Me: So it might not be true. Got it.

The bell rang, so I grabbed my stuP and shoved it into my bag. Jocelyn and I started walking toward our lockers, and she said, “Before I tell you, you have to promise you’re not going to get all worked up before you hear everything.”

“Oh my God.” My stomach stress-dropped, and I asked, “What’s going on?”

We turned down the west wing, and before I had a chance to even look at her, I saw him walking toward me.

Michael Young?

I came to a complete halt.

“Aaaand—there’s my tea,” Joss said, but I wasn’t listening.

People bumped oP me and went around me as I stood there and stared. He looked the same, only taller and broader and more attractive (if that was even a possibility). My childhood crush moved in slow motion, with tiny blue birds chirping and Aitting their wings around his head as his golden hair blew in a sparkling breeze.

I think my heart might have stopped.

Michael had lived down the street when we were little, and he’d been everything to me. I’d loved him as far back as I could remember. He’d always been next-level amazing. Smart, sophisticated, and… I don’t know… dreamier than any other boy. He’d run around with the neighborhood kids (me, Wes, the Potter boys on the corner, and Jocelyn), doing typical neighborhood things—

playing hide-and-seek, tag, touch football, ding-dong-ditch, etc. But while Wes and the Potters had enjoyed things like Ainging mud into my hair because it made me scream, Michael had been doing things like identifying leaves, reading thick books, and not joining in on their torture.

My brain cued up “Someone Like You,” and the song started over from the beginning.

I’ve been searching a long time,

For someone exactly like you.

He was wearing khakis and a nice black shirt, the kind of out1t that showed he knew what looked good but also didn’t spend too much time on fashion. His hair was thick and blond and styled the same as his clothes—intentionally casual.

I wondered what it smelled like.

His hair, not his clothes.

He must’ve sensed a stalker in his midst, because the slo-mo stopped, the birds disappeared, and he looked right at me.

“Liz?”

I was so happy that I’d taken the time to apply Retrograde Red. Clearly the cosmos had known Michael would be appearing before me that day, so it had done everything in its power to make me presentable.

“Girl, chill,” Joss said between her teeth, but I was helpless to stop the whole-face smile that broke free as I said, “Michael Young?”

I heard Joss mutter “Here we go,” but I did not care.

Michael came over and wrapped me in a hug, and I let my hands slide around his shoulders. Oh my God, oh my God! My stomach went wild as I felt his 1ngers on my back, and I realized that we could very well be having our meet-cute.

Oh. My. God.

I was dressed for it; he was beautiful. Could this moment be more perfect? I made eye contact with Joss, who was slowly shaking her head, but it didn’t matter.

Michael was back.

He smelled good—so, so good—and I wanted to catalogue every tiny detail of the moment. The soft, worn-in feel of his shirt under my palms, the breadth of his shoulders, the golden skin of his neck, scant centimeters away from my face as I hugged him back.

Was it wrong to close my eyes and take a deep brea—

“Oof.” Someone bumped into us, hard, destroying the hug. I was shoved into and then away from Michael, and as I turned around, I saw who it was.

“Wes!” I said, irritated that he’d ruined our moment, but so unbelievably happy still that I beamed at him anyway. I was incapable of not smiling. “You should really watch where you’re going.”

His eyebrows crinkled together. “Yeah…?”

He was watching me, probably wondering why I was smiling instead of going ballistic over the packing tape incident. He looked like someone waiting for the punch line, and his confusion kicked up my happiness to an even higher level. I giggled and said, “Yeah, you big doof. You could really hurt someone. Buddy.”

He narrowed his eyes and talked slower. “Sorry—I was talking to Carson and doing the extremely difficult backward-walking thing. But enough about me.

How was your drive to school?”

I knew he wanted to hear all the details, like how long it had taken me to remove the tape or the fact that I’d broken two freshly manicured nails, but I wasn’t about to give that aggravator the satisfaction. “Really, really great—

thanks for asking.”

“Wesley.” Michael did a bro handshake with Wes—when had they had time to choreograph that little touch of adorability?—and said, “You were right on about the biology teacher.”

“It’s because you sat by me. She haaaates me.” Wes grinned and started talking, but I ignored that tool and watched Michael speak and laugh and be as sweetly charming as I’d remembered.

Only now he had a slightly Southern drawl.

Michael Young had a soft accent that made me want to personally handwrite a thank-you note to the great state of Texas for making him even more appealing than he’d already been. I crossed my arms and pretty much melted into a puddle as I enjoyed the view.

Jocelyn, who I might have forgotten existed in the presence of such lovely Michaelhood, nudged me with her elbow and whispered, “Settle down. You’re drooling all over yourself.”

I rolled my eyes and ignored her.

“Hey, listen.” Wes hitched up his backpack and pointed at Michael.

“Remember Ryan Clark?”

“Of course.” Michael smiled and looked like a congressional intern. “First baseman, right?”

“Exactly.” Wes lowered his voice. “Ryno’s having a party tomorrow at his dad’s—you should totally come.”

I tried to keep my expression neutral as I listened to Wes ask my Michael to come to his party. I mean, Wes did hang out with the guys that Michael used to know, but still. They were best friends all of a sudden or something?

That wouldn’t be good for me. Couldn’t be.

Because Wes Bennett got oP on messing with me—he always had. In grade school, Wes was the guy who’d put a frog in my Barbie DreamHouse and a decapitated lawn gnome’s severed head in my homemade Little Free Library. In middle school, he was the guy who’d thought it was hilarious to pretend he didn’t see me when I was lying out, and then water his mom’s bushes,

“accidentally” spraying the hose right over me until I screamed.

And now, in high school, he was the guy who’d made it his mission to harass me daily over The Spot. I’d grown a backbone since we were kids, so technically now I was the girl who yelled over the fence when his jock friends were over and they were so rowdy, I could hear them over my music. But still.

“Sounds good,” Michael said with a nod, and I wondered what he’d look like in a cowboy hat and Aannel shirt. Maybe a pair of shitkickers, even though I didn’t technically know what diPerentiated a shitkicker from a regular cowboy boot.

I’d have to Google it later.

“I’ll text you the details. I gotta go—If I’m late to my next class, I’ve got detention for sure.” He turned and started jogging in the other direction with a yell of “Later, guys.”

Michael watched Wes’s disappearance before looking down at me and drawling, “He lit out of here so fast, I didn’t get to ask. Is it casual dress?”

“What? Um, the party?” Like I had any idea what they wore to their jockstrap parties. “Probably?”

“I’ll ask Wesley.”

“Cool.” I worked to give him my top-shelf smile, even though I was dying over the fact that Wes had screwed up my meet-cute.

“I’ve gotta run too,” he said, but added, “I can’t wait to catch up, though.”

Then take me with you to the party! I yelled internally.

“Joss?” Michael looked past me, and his mouth dropped open. “Is that you?”

She rolled her eyes. “Took you long enough.”

Jocelyn had always been closer to the neighborhood boys, playing football with Wes and Michael while I did awful cartwheels around the park and made up songs. Since then, she’d turned into this tall and freakishly good-looking

human. Today her braids were all pulled back into a ponytail, but instead of looking messy like when I wore a ponytail, it showed oP her cheekbones.

The warning bell rang, and he pointed up at the speaker. “That’s me. See y’all later.”

Y’all.

He went the other way, and Jocelyn and I started walking. I said, “I can’t believe Wes didn’t invite us to the party.”

She gave me side-eye. “Do you even know who Ryno is?”

“No, but that’s beside the point. He invited Michael right in front of us. It’s common courtesy that he should invite us, too.”

“But you hate Wes.”

“So?”

“So why would you want him to invite you anywhere?”

I sighed. “His rudeness just pisses me oP.”

“Well I, for one, am glad he didn’t, because I don’t want to go to any party that those guys are having. I’ve been to Ryno’s, and it’s all about beer bongs, Fireball, and that never-have-I-ever kind of immature stuP.”

Joss used to hang out with the popular kids before she quit volleyball, so she’d “partied” a little before we became friends. “But—”

“Listen.” Jocelyn stopped walking and grabbed my arm to stop me from walking too. “That’s what I was going to tell you. Kate said he lives next door to Laney and they’ve been talking for a couple weeks now.”

“Laney? Laney Morgan?” Nooo. It couldn’t be true. No-no-no-no, please, God, no. “But he just got here—”

“Apparently he moved back a month ago but was 1nishing classes online at his other school. Rumor has it that he and Laney are almost official.”

Not Laney. My stomach clenched as I pictured her perfect little nose. I knew it was irrational, but the idea of Laney and Michael was almost too much for me to bear. That girl always got everything I wanted. She couldn’t have him, dammit.

The thought of them, together, made my throat tight. It made my heart hurt.

It would crush me.

Because not only was he everything I daydreamed about, but he and I had history. The wonderful, important kind of history that involved drinking from garden hoses and catching lightning bugs. I thought back to the last time I’d seen Michael. It’d been at his house. His family had had a cookout to say goodbye to all the neighbors, and I’d walked over with my parents. My mom had made her famous cheesecake bars, and Michael had met us at the door and oPered us drinks like he was a grown-up.

My mom had called it the most adorable thing she’d ever seen.

All the neighborhood kids played kickball in the street for hours that night, and the adults even joined us for a game. At one point, my mother was high-1ving Michael after stealing home base in her Aoral sundress and wedge sandals.

That moment was pressed in my memories like a yellowed photograph in an antique album.

I don’t think Michael ever had a clue as to how madly in love with him I’d been. They moved a month before my mom died, breaking the tip of my soon-to-be shattered heart.

Jocelyn looked at me like she knew exactly what I was thinking. “Michael Young is not your racing-to-the-train-station dude. Got it?”

But he could be. “Well, technically they aren’t official yet, so…”

We started walking again, dodging bodies as we headed for her locker. We were probably going to be late because of our impromptu hallway meet-up with Michael, but it would totally be worth it.

“Seriously. Don’t be that girl.” She gave me her motherly scowl. “That there with Michael was not your meet-cute.”

“But.” I didn’t even want to say it because I didn’t want her to shoot it down.

Still, I almost squealed when I said, “What if it was?”

“Oh my god. I knew, the second I heard he was back, that you were going to lose it.” Her eyebrows went down, and so did the corners of her lips as she stopped in front of the locker and turned the lock. “You don’t even know the guy anymore, Liz.”

I could still hear his deep voice saying y’all, and my stomach dipped. “I know everything I need to know.”

She sighed and pulled out her backpack. “Is there anything I can say to yank you back from this?”

I tilted my head. “Um… he hates cats, maybe?”

She held up a 1nger. “That’s right—I forgot. He hates cats.”

“He does not.” I grinned and sighed, thinking back. “He used to have these two snarky cats that he adored. You should’ve seen the way he treated those babies.”

“Ew.”

“Whatever, hater of felines.” I felt alive, buzzing with the thrill of romantic possibilities as I leaned against the closed locker next door. “Michael Young is fair game until I hear an official proclamation.”

“I can’t talk to you when you’re like this.”

“Happy? Excited? Hopeful?” I wanted to skip down the hall yell-singing

“Paper Rings.”

“Delusional.” Jocelyn looked at her phone for a minute, then back at me.

“Hey, my mom said she can take us dress shopping tomorrow night if you want.”

My mind went blank. I had to say something. “I think I have to work.”

She narrowed her eyes. “Every time I bring it up, you have to work. Don’t you want to get a dress?”

“Sure. Yeah.” I forced up the corners of my mouth. “Of course.”

But the truth was that I so did not.

The thrill of the dress was its ability to inspire romance, to make one’s date speechless. If that factor wasn’t in play, the prom dress was just an overpriced waste of fabric.

Adding to that, there was the screaming fact that shopping with Jocelyn’s mom for dresses was just a huge reminder that my mom wasn’t there to join us, which made it a wildly unappealing outing. My mother wouldn’t be there to take pictures and get teary as her baby attended the 1nal dance of her childhood, and nothing made that hit home quite like seeing Joss’s mom do those things for her.

To be honest, I hadn’t been emotionally prepared for the emptiness that seemed to accompany my senior year, the many reminders of my mom’s absence.

Senior pictures, homecoming, college applications, prom, graduation; as everyone I knew got excited about those high school benchmarks, I got stress headaches because nothing felt the way I’d planned for it to feel.

Everything felt… lonely.

Because even though the senior activities were fun, without my mom they were void of sentimentality. My dad tried to be involved, he really did, but he wasn’t an emotional guy, so it always just felt like he was the official photographer as I traversed the highlights alone.

Meanwhile, Joss didn’t understand why I didn’t want to make a big deal out of every single senior milestone like she did. She’d been pissed at me for three days when I’d blown oP the spring break trip to the beach, but it had felt more like an exam I was dreading than an actual good time, and I just couldn’t.

However. Finding a rom-com happy ending that my mother would have loved—that could change all the bad feels to good, couldn’t it?

I smiled at Jocelyn. “I’ll text you after I check my schedule.”

CHAPTER TWO

“A woman friend. This is amazing. You

may be the first attractive woman I

have not wanted to sleep with in my

entire life.”

—When Harry Met Sally

Michael was back.

I propped my feet up on the kitchen table and dug my spoon into the container of Americone Dream, still beside myself with giddiness. In my wildest dreams, I wouldn’t have imagined the return of Michael Young.

I didn’t think I’d ever see him again.

After he moved, I daydreamed for years about him coming back. I used to imagine I was out taking a walk on one of those gloriously cold autumn days that whispered of winter, the air smelling like snow. I’d be wearing my favorite out1t—which changed with each imagining, of course, because this fantasy started back in grade school—and when I’d turn the corner at the end of the block, there he’d be, walking toward me. I think there was even romantic running involved. I mean, why wouldn’t there be?

There were also no less than a hundred brokenhearted entries in my childhood diaries about his exit from my life. I’d found them a few years ago when we were cleaning out the garage, and the entries were surprisingly dark for a little kid.

Probably because his absence in my life was timed so closely with my mother’s death.

Eventually I’d accepted that neither of them were coming back.

But now he’d returned.

And it felt like getting a little piece of happiness back.

I didn’t have any classes with him, so fate couldn’t intervene by throwing us together, which sucked so badly. I mean, what were the odds that we’d have zero occasions for forced interaction? Joss had a class with him, and clearly Wes did as well. Why not me? How was I supposed to show him we were meant to go to prom and fall in love and live happily ever after when I didn’t ever see him? I hummed along to Anna of the North in my headphones—the sexy hot tub song from To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before—and stared out the window at the rain.

The one thing in my favor was that I was kind of a love expert.

I didn’t have a degree and I hadn’t taken any classes, but I’d watched thousands of hours of romantic comedies in my life. And I hadn’t just watched.

I’d analyzed them with the observational acuity of a clinical psychologist.

Not only that, but love was in my genes. My mother had been a screenwriter who’d churned out a lot of great small-screen romantic comedies. My dad was 100 percent certain that she would’ve been the next Nora Ephron if she’d just had a little more time.

So even though I had zero practical experience, between my inherited knowledge and my extensive research, I knew a lot about love. And everything I knew made me certain that in order for Michael and me to happen, I would need to be at Ryno’s party.

Which wasn’t going to be easy, because not only did I have no idea who Ryno even was but I had zero interest in attending a party 1lled with the jocks’ sweaty armpits and the populars’ stinky beer breath.

But I needed to get reacquainted with Michael before some awful blonde who shall remain nameless beat me to him, so I’d have to 1nd a way to make it work.

Lightning shot across the sky and illuminated Wes’s big car, all snuggled up against the curb in front of my house, rain bouncing hard oP of its hood. That assbag had been right behind me all the way home from school, and when I’d pulled forward to properly parallel park, he’d slid right into The Spot.

What kind of monster parked nose-1rst in a street spot?

As I honked and yelled at him through the torrential downpour, he waved to me and ran inside his house. I ended up having to park around the corner, in front of Mrs. Scarapelli’s duplex, and my hair and dress had been drenched by the time I burst through my front door.

Don’t even ask about the new shoes.

I licked oP the spoon and wished Michael lived next door instead of Wes.

Then it hit me.

“Holy God.”

Wes was my in. Wes, who had invited Michael to the party in the 1rst place, would obviously be attending. What if he could get me in?

Although… he didn’t do things to help me. Like, ever. Wes’s joy was derived from torture, not generosity. So how could I convince him? What could I give him? I needed to come up with something—some tangible thing—that would get him to help me out and keep his mouth shut at the same time.

I dug out another spoonful of ice cream and put it in my mouth. Stared out the window.

This was a no-brainer.

“Well, well.” Wes stood inside his house, behind the screen door, looking out at me in the rain with a smirk on his face. “To what do I owe this honor?”

“Let me in. I need to talk.”

“I don’t know—are you going to hurt me if I let you in?”

“Come on,” I said through gritted teeth as the driving rain pelted my head.

“I’m getting drenched out here.”

“I know—and I’m sorry—but I am seriously afraid you’re going to junk-punch me for stealing the Spot if I let you come inside.” He opened the door a crack, enough to show me how warm and dry he looked in jeans and a T-shirt, and said, “You’re a little scary sometimes, Liz.”

“Wes!” Wes’s mom came up behind him and looked horri1ed as she saw me standing out in the rain. “For the love of God, open the door for the poor girl.”

“But I think she’s here to kill me.” He said it like a scared little kid, and I could tell his mom was trying not to smile.

“Get inside, Liz.” Wes’s mom grabbed my arm and gently pulled me across the threshold to where it was warm and smelled like dryer sheets. “My son is a nuisance and he’s sorry.”

“No, I’m not.”

“Tell me what he did and I’ll help you punish him.”

I pushed the wet hair oP my face, looked directly at him, and said to his mom,

“He stole my spot when I was trying to parallel park.”

“Oh my God, you told my mom on me?” Wes closed the front door and followed me and his mother inside. “Well, if we’re randomly tattling, Mom, I should probably tell you that Liz was the one who called the cops on my car when I had pneumonia.”

“Wait, what?” I stopped and turned around. “When were you sick?”

“Well, when did you call?” He put both hands on his heart, fake-coughed, and said, “I was too ill to even move my car.”

“Stop.” I didn’t know if he was messing with me or not, but I suspected he wasn’t, and I felt like a monster because as much as I loved besting him, I didn’t like the thought of him being sick. “Were you seriously sick?”

His dark eyes swept over my face, and he said, “Would you seriously care?”

“Knock it oP, you little brats.” His mom gestured for us to follow her into the family room. “Sit on the couch, eat some cookies, and get over yourselves.”

She plopped a plate of chocolate chip cookies down on the coPee table, fetched a gallon of milk and two glasses, tossed me a towel, reminded Wes that he had to pick up his sister at six thirty, and then she left us alone.

The woman was a force.

“Ohh.” Kate & Leopold was playing on one of those retro TV channels that only old people watched, and I rubbed the towel over my hair as Meg Ryan’s character tried evading the charm of a very British Hugh Jackman. “I love this movie.”

“Of course you do.” He gave me a grin that made me uncomfortable, like he knew things about me that I didn’t know he knew, and he leaned down and grabbed a cookie. “So what do you want to talk to me about?”

My cheeks got warm, mainly because I was scared to death he was going to make fun of me—and tell Michael—when I told him what I wanted. I sat down on the sofa, set the towel beside me, and said, “Okay. Here’s the thing. I kind of need your help.”

He started smiling immediately. I held up a hand and said, “Nope. Listen. I know you’re not one to help out of the goodness of your heart, so I’ve got a

proposition for you.”

“Ouch. Like I’m some kind of a mercenary or something. That hurts.”

“No, it doesn’t.”

He conceded with a shrug. “No, it really doesn’t.”

“Okay.” It took a lot of self-control not to roll my eyes at him. “But before I tell you what I want you to help with, I want to go over the terms of the deal.”

He crossed his arms—when had his chest gotten so wide?—and tilted his head. “Go on.”

“Okay.” I took a deep breath and tucked my hair behind my ears. “First of all, you have to swear to secrecy. If you tell anyone about our deal, it is void and you don’t get payment. Second, if you agree to the deal, you have to actually help me.

You can’t just do a little and then blow me oP.”

I paused, and he looked at me through narrowed eyes. “Well? What’s the payment?”

“The payment will be uncontested, twenty-four/seven access to the parking spot for the duration of our deal.”

“Whoa.” He walked over and plopped down in the chair across from me.

“You will give me THE parking spot?”

I so didn’t want to, but I also knew how badly Wes wanted it. He and his dad were always tinkering with his old car, mostly because it never started, and their toolboxes looked wildly heavy whenever I got The Spot and they had to haul them all the way down to the end of the street to get it going. “That’s correct.”

His smile went big. “I’m in. I’m doing it. I’m your guy.”

“You can’t say that yet—you don’t even know what the deal is.”

“Doesn’t matter. I’ll do whatever it takes.”

“What if I want you to run naked through the commons during lunch?”

“Done.”

I grabbed the throw that was folded over the arm of the couch and wrapped it around my shoulders. “What if I want you to turn naked cartwheels through the commons during lunch while singing the entire Hamilton soundtrack?”

“You got it. I love ‘My Shot.’”

“Seriously?” That made me smile, even though I wasn’t used to smiling at Wes. “But can you even do a cartwheel?”

“Yup.”

“Prove it.”

“You’re so high maintenance.” Wes stood, shoved the coPee table out of the way with his foot, and did the most awful cartwheel I’d ever seen. His legs were bent and didn’t turn over his head at all, but he stuck the landing with over-the-head gymnastics arms and a con1dent smile before plopping back into his chair.

“Now tell me.”

I coughed out the laugh I was trying to hold in and searched his face. I was looking for honesty, some kind of hint that I could trust him, but I got sidetracked by how dark his eyes were and the way he Aexed his jaw. I thought of the time in seventh grade when he’d given me six dollars to get me to stop crying.

Helena and my dad had just gotten married, and they’d decided to remodel the main level of the house. In preparation, Helena had cleaned out the closets and drawers and donated all of the old stuP. Including my mother’s DVD

collection.

When I’d had an emotional meltdown and my dad had explained the situation to Helena, she’d felt awful. She’d apologized over and over again while I’d sobbed. But all I’d been able to focus on were her words to my dad: “I just didn’t think anyone watched those cheesy movies.”

I’d been a resourceful kid—still was resourceful, as proven by my being at Wes’s house at that very moment—and it had only taken one phone call to 1nd out where the movies had ended up. I’d snuck out, lying to my dad and saying I was going to Jocelyn’s, and ridden my bike all the way to the thrift store. I had every penny of my babysitting money in my front pocket, but when I got there, it wasn’t enough.

“We’re going to sell this as a collection, kid—you can’t by them individually.”

I stared at that price tag, and no matter how many times I counted, I was six dollars short. The jerk at the store was unyielding, and I cried all the way home on my hot-pink bike. It felt like I was losing my mom all over again.

When I was almost home, I saw Wes bouncing a basketball in his driveway.

He looked at me with his usual face, half smiling like he knew some secret about me, but then he stopped dribbling.

“Hey.” He tossed the ball onto the grass in his front yard and walked toward me. “What’s wrong?”

I remember not wanting to tell him because I knew he’d think it was ridiculous, but there was something about his eyes that made me break down all over again. I bawled like a baby while I told him what happened, but instead of laughing at me, he listened. He stayed silent through my entire breakdown, and once I stopped talking and started hiccupping embarrassing little sobs, he leaned forward and wiped my tears with his thumbs.

“Don’t cry, Liz.” He looked sad when he said it, like he wanted to cry too.

Then he said, “Wait here.”

He gave me the One sec 1nger before turning and running into his house. I stood there, exhausted from the crying and shocked by his niceness, and when he came out his front door, he gave me a ten-dollar bill. I remember looking up at him and thinking he had the kindest brown eyes, but my thoughts must’ve shown on my face because he immediately gave me a scowl and said, “This is just to shut you up ’cause I can’t stand to listen to you bawling for another minute.

And I want my change.”

My mind jerked me back to Wes’s family room. Michael. The Spot. Needing Wes’s help.

My eyes ran over his face. Yeah, his brown eyes still looked exactly the same.

“Okay.” I picked up a cookie and took a bite. “But I swear on everything holy that I will hire a hit man if you blab about this.”

“I very much believe you. Now spill it.”

I had to look at something other than his face. I went with my lap, staring at the smooth texture of my leggings when I said, “Okay. Here’s the thing. Michael is back in town, and I was kind of hoping to, y’know, touch base with him. We were close before he moved away, and I want to get that back again.”

“And I can help with that how, exactly?”

I kept my eyes down, tracing the seam of my pants with my index 1nger.

“Well, I don’t have any classes with him, so there’s no way for me to talk to him naturally. But you and Michael are already friends. You hang out. You invited him to a party.” I dared to look at him when I said, “You’ve got the connection that I want.”

He tossed the rest of his cookie into his mouth, chewed it up, and dusted his hands on the knees of his pants. “Let me get this straight. You are still starry-eyed over Young, and you want me to drag you along to Ryno’s party so you can get him to like you.”

I considered denying it, but instead said, “Basically.”

His jaw Aexed. “I heard he’s kind of interested in Laney.”

Ugh, no. My own personal investment in the situation aside, Laney Morgan was totally wrong for Michael. In fact, nudging him to fall in love with me would be doing him a favor simply by saving him from that. I said, “Don’t you worry about that.”

An eyebrow went up. “How positively scandalous of you, Elizabeth.”

“Shut it.”

He smiled. “You can’t think that just showing up at a party is going to make him notice you. There’s going to be a ton of people there.”

“I only need a few minutes.”

“Pretty con1dent, are we?”

“I am.” I’d already written a script. “I have a plan.”

“And it is…?”

I tucked my legs underneath me. “Like I’m telling you.”

“Nah.” He got up, moved to the couch, and plopped down beside me. “Your plan sucks.”

I wrapped the throw more tightly around my shoulders. “How could you possibly know that when you don’t know my plan?”

“Because I’ve known you since you were 1ve, Liz. I’m sure your plan involves a contrived meeting, an entire notebook’s worth of silly ideas, and someone riding oP into the sunset.”

He was close, but I said, “You’re way oP base.”

“Bet.”

I sighed. “So…?” All I needed was for The Spot to be a stronger draw than Wes’s determination to antagonize me.

Wes crossed his arms and looked pleased with himself. “So…?”

“Oh my God, you’re torturing me on purpose. Are you going to help me or not?”

He scratched his chin. “I just don’t know if The Spot is worth it.”

“Worth what? Allowing me to be in your presence for a few hours?” I tucked a wet curl behind my ear. “You’ll barely even know I’m there.”

“What if I’m trying to hit it oP with someone?” The look on his face was so creepy, I smiled in spite of myself. “Your presence might mess with my mojo.”

“Trust me, you won’t even notice me. I’ll be too busy making Michael fall wildly in love with me to even touch your mojo.”

“Ew. Stop talking about touching my mojo, you perv.”

I rolled my eyes and turned toward him. “Are you going to say yes, or what?”

He smirked and kicked his feet up onto the coPee table. “I do love watching you take the walk of shame from Mrs. Scarapelli’s. It’s kind of my new favorite hobby. So I guess I’ll drag you along to the party.”

“Yes!” I stopped myself from doing a 1st pump in victory.

“Settle your ass down.” Wes leaned forward, grabbed the remote, and turned up the volume on the TV before looking at me as if I smelled bad. “Wait—this movie? You love this movie?”

“I know it’s a weird premise, but I swear to you that it’s great.”

“I’ve seen it. This movie is trash, are you kidding me?”

“It is not trash. It’s about 1nding someone so right for you that you’d be willing to drop everything and traverse centuries for them. She literally ditches her life and moves to 1876. I mean, that is a powerful love.” I looked at the TV, and my brain started quoting along with the movie. “Are you sure you’ve seen this movie?”

“I’m positive.” He shook his head and watched as Stuart begged the nurse to let him leave the hospital. “This movie is formulaic, aspartame-infused, tropey garbage.”

“Of course.” Why would I expect Wes to surprise me? “Of course Wes Bennett is a rom-com snob. I would expect no less.”

“I’m not a rom-com snob, whatever that even is, but a discerning viewer who expects more than a predictable plot with 1ll-in-the-blank characters.”

“Oh, please.” I put my feet on the coPee table. “Exploding buildings and high-speed chases aren’t predictable?”

“You’re making the assumption that I like action movies.”

“You don’t?”

“Oh, I do.” He tossed the remote onto the table and grabbed his glass. “But you shouldn’t assume.”

“But I was right.”

“Whatever.” He drank the last of his milk and set down his glass. “Bottom line—chick Aicks are laughingly unrealistic. Like, ‘Oh, these two are so diPerent and hate each other so much, but—wait. Are they so diPerent after all?’”

“Enemies-to-lovers. It’s a classic trope .”

“Oh, good God, you think it’s awesome.” He narrowed his eyes, leaned over, and patted me on the head. “You poor, confused little love lover. Tell me you don’t think this movie is remotely connected to reality in any way.”

I smacked his hand away from my head. “Yeah, because I believe in time travel.”

“Not that.” He gestured toward the TV. “Time travel is probably the most realistic part. I’m talking about rom-coms in general. Relationships never ever, ever work like that.”

“Yes, they do.”

His eyebrows went up. “They do? Correct me if I’m wrong, but it didn’t seem like it worked that way with Jeremiah Green or Tad Miranda.”

I was kind of taken aback by his awareness of my romantic history (or lack thereof), but I supposed it was inevitable when we were in the same grade at the same school.

“Well, they can.” I pushed my still-damp hair out of my face and wasn’t surprised that Wes thought the way he did. I’d never heard of him being serious with any girl—ever—so it was probably safe to assume he was your classic player-type jock. “It’s out there, even if the jaded, cynical people like you are too, um…

cynical to believe.”

“You said ‘cynical’ twice.”

Sigh.

He smiled at my irritation. “So you think that two enemies—in the real world

—can magically get over their diPerences and fall madly in love?”

“I do.”

“And you think that plotting and planning and trickery is no big deal if it’s done to spark some sort of true love?”

I chewed on my lip. Was that what I was doing? Trickery? The thought put a little twist in my stomach, but I ignored it. That wasn’t what was happening here. I said, “You’re making it sound ridiculous on purpose.”

“Oh, no—it’s just ridiculous.”

“You’re ridiculous.” I realized I was gritting my teeth, and I relaxed my jaw.

Who cared what Wes thought about love, anyway?

He got a little smirk going and said, “Have you thought about the fact that if your little love notions are valid, then Michael is actually not the guy for you?”

Nope; he was the guy for me. Had to be. Still, I asked, “What do you mean?”

“At this point, you and Michael aren’t mad at each other, so it’s doomed.

Every rom-com has two people who can’t stand each other in the beginning but eventually bang it out.”

“Gross.”

“Seriously. You’ve Got Mail. The Ugly Truth. Um… When Harry Met Sally, 10 Things I Hate About You, Sweet Home Alabam—”

“First of all, Sweet Home Alabama is a second-chance-at-love trope, asshat.”

“Ooh—my bad.”

“Second of all, you’re a little impressive with your rom-com knowledge, Bennett. Are you sure you aren’t a closet watcher?”

He gave me a look. “Positive.”

I really was a little impressed; I loved The Ugly Truth. “I won’t tell anyone if you secretly fangirl over romance Aicks.”

“Shut it.” He chuckled and gave his head a slow shake. “So what trope works for you and Michael, then? The followed-him-around-like-a-puppy-but-now-hesees-the-puppy-as-a-potential-girlfriend-even-though-he-already-has-a-potential-girlfriend trope?”

“You are an obnoxious love hater.” It was all I could think of to throw back at him, because—all of a sudden—Wes had the uncanny ability to make me laugh.

Like, even as he made fun of me, I had to force myself to not give in to another giggle.

But we had a deal, so we exchanged numbers so he could text me after he talked to Michael, and we decided that he was going to pick me up for the party at seven o’clock the following day.

As I walked back to my house in the rain, I couldn’t believe he’d agreed to it. I was a little unsure about going anywhere with Wes, but a girl did what she had to in the name of true love.

I wasn’t a fan of running in the rain or in the dark, so doing both at the same time was a major suckfest. Helena had made spaghetti by the time I’d gotten home from Wes’s, so I’d had to sit down for a full-scale family dinner—complete with How was your day conversation—before I could take oP. My dad tried to convince me to hit the new treadmill he’d bought the day before, since it was pouring outside, but that was a non-option for me.

My daily run had nothing to do with exercise.

I tightened the string on my hood, put my head down, and hit the sidewalk, my worn-out Brooks splashing water up onto my leggings with every step. It was cold and miserable, and I picked up my pace when I turned the corner at the end of the street and could see the cemetery through the downpour.

I didn’t slow until I went through the gates, up the familiar one-lane blacktop road, and just past the crooked elm; then I ran 1fteen steps farther to the left.

“This weather sucks, Ma,” I said as I stopped next to my mother’s headstone, putting my hands on my hips and sucking air while trying to slow my pant.

“Seriously.”

I dropped to a squat beside her, running my hand over the slick marble. I usually sat down on the grass, but it was way too wet for that. The driving rain made it seem even darker than normal in the shaded cemetery, but I knew the place by heart, so it didn’t bother me.

In a weird way, this was my happy place.

“So Michael is back—I’m sure you saw—and he seems just as perfect as ever.

I’m going to see him again tomorrow.” I pictured her face, like I always did when I was here, and said, “You’d be excited about this one.” Even if I had to go to Wes

for help. My mom had always thought Wes was sweet but that he played too rough.

“It just feels like it’s a fate thing, the way he was kind of dropped into my lap right after I was listening to ‘Someone Like You.’ I mean, what’s more fate-y than that? Your favorite song, from our favorite movie, and our favorite cute-ex-neighbor just happened to drop in? I feel like you’re writing this Happily Ever After from your spot…”

I trailed oP and gestured at the sky. “Up there somewhere.”

Even the cold rain couldn’t keep me from being excited as I described his Southern “y’all” accent for my mom. I squatted beside her chiseled name and rambled, like I did every day, until the alarm on my phone buzzed. This ritual had kind of become like an oral diary over the years, except I wasn’t recording, and no one was listening. Well, except—I hoped my mom was.

It was time to head back.

I stood and patted her headstone. “See you tomorrow. Love you.”

I took a deep breath before turning and jogging down the hill. The rain was still coming down hard, but muscle memory made it easy to stay on the path.

And as I ran past Wes’s house and turned into my driveway, I realized I was more excited than I’d been in a really long time.

“Liz.”

I glanced up from my Lit homework to see Joss climbing in my window, with Kate and Cassidy following behind her. We’d discovered years ago that if you climbed onto the roof of my old playhouse in the backyard, you were just high enough to slide open the bedroom window and step right in.

“Hey, guys.” I cracked my back and turned around in my desk chair, surprised to see them. “What’s up?”

“We just got done with a planning meeting for the senior prank, but we don’t want to go home yet because my dad said I could stay out until nine, and it’s only eight forty.” Cassidy—whose parents were wicked strict—plopped down on my bed, and Kate followed, while Joss sat her backside on my window seat and said, “So we’re hiding here for twenty more minutes.”

I readied myself for pressure from them about the senior prank.

“It was basically, like, thirty people jammed into Burger King, loudly shouting out ideas of things they think are funny.” Joss giggled and said, “Tyler Beck thinks we should just let loose with, like, twenty thousand Super Balls in the hallways—and he knows a guy who can hook us up.”

Kate laughed and said, “Swear to God he had the whole group convinced it was the money idea. Until he said he would need actual money.”

“We seniors are funny, but cheap as hell.” Cassidy lay back on my bed and said, “I personally liked Joey Lee’s idea to just say screw it and do something horrible, like Aipping over all the shelves in the library or Aooding the school. He said it was ‘ironically funny because it’s so terribly not funny’ and that it ‘would never be forgotten.’”

“That’s de1nitely true,” I said, taking out my ponytail and digging my hands into my hair. I didn’t want to look at Joss because I felt like she’d take one glance and know I’d been scheming with Wes, so I kept my eyes on Cass.

“You should’ve been there, Liz,” Joss said, and I prepared myself for what came next. A lecture about how we were only seniors once, perhaps? She was really good at those. Just do it, Liz. We’re only high school seniors for a few more months.

But when I looked at her, she grinned instead and said, “Everyone was talking about ideas, and then Conner Abel said, ‘My house got forked once.’”

My mouth fell open. “Shut up!”

“Right?” Kate squealed.

Last year, when I was crushing hard on Conner, we thought it’d be funny to fork his front yard one Saturday night when there was nothing going on and we were all sleeping over at my house. Yes, it was silly, but we were juniors—we didn’t know any better. But in the middle of the midnight forking, his dad came outside to let the dog do its business. We took oP running into the neighbor’s yard, but not before the dog managed to catch his teeth on Joss’s pajama pants, exposing her underwear for all to see.

Joss cackled and said, “It was hilarious because, you know, he uttered the bizarro words ‘My house got forked.’”

“I cannot believe he said that,” I laughed.

She shook her head and added, “But it was also funny because someone asked him what the hell he was talking about, and listen to this. He said, and I quote,

‘A bunch of girls stuck forks all over my front yard last year, and then one mooned us while running away. I shit you not, dudes.’”

“Shut up!” I died laughing then, leaning into the memory of those good times. They were pure, in a way, untouched by my stressful senior issues that had stained the memories we’d been making this year. “Did it kill you not to take credit for it?”

She nodded, stood, and went over to my closet. “Big time, but I knew we’d come out looking like obsessed stalkers if I confessed.”

I watched as she Aipped through my dresses, and then she asked, “Where’s the red checked dress?”

“It’s buPalo plaid, and it’s on the other side.” I pointed and said, “With the casual shirts.”

“I knew the layout, but I would’ve pictured it with the dresses.”

“Too casual.”

“Of course.” She looked through the other rack, found the dress, and then pulled it oP the hanger and draped it over her arm. “So what’d you do tonight?

Just homework?”

I blinked, caught in the headlights, but Cass and Kate weren’t even paying attention, and Joss was looking at the dress. I cleared my throat and muttered a quick, “Pretty much. Hey—do you know how much of Gatsby we’re supposed to read for tomorrow?”

Cass said, “Guys, we need to hit it” at the same time Joss said, “The rest of it.”

“Thanks,” I managed, while my friends made their way to the window and scrambled out the same way they’d come. Joss was about to swing her leg over when she said, “Your hair looks supercute like that, by the way. Did you curl it?”

I thought of Wes’s living room and how drenched my hair had been when I’d arrived. “No. I, um, I just got caught in the rain after school.”

She smiled. “You should be so lucky every day, right?”

“Yeah.” I pictured Wes’s cartwheel and wanted to roll my eyes. “Right.”

Document Outline

Title_Page

Dedication

Prologue

Chapter_One

Chapter_Two