I brush my teeth and touch some pink gloss to my lips as Trey hangs on the other side of the bathroom door, waiting to get in, and I realize I’m the one who should be furious. After all, I bet Sawyer could have stopped his dad from calling my dad.
“He must think I’m a total nutball,” I murmur as I swipe a little raisin-colored eyeliner under my lower lashes.
“I totally do,” Trey says through the crack in the door. “Can you move it along? My hair needs clay before it dries like this. I practically have a ’fro.”
I open the door and he stumbles in over a new pile of magazines that surfaced since last night.
“You okay?” he asks. He got home during the muttering portion of my fight with Dad, and I’d filled him in on the rest, except of course for the real reason why I had to go see Sawyer. And I get the feeling Trey thinks there’s something relational going on between Sawyer and me . . . which I’m happy to go along with.
“Yeah, I’m okay,” I say in a low voice. “It’s just so stupid.” And the bigger part of me that can’t deal with the truth is crying out the thing I’m not quite ready to acknowledge. That even though I warned Sawyer, he could still die if he doesn’t do anything about what I told him.
Trey sculpts his hair expertly and whispers, “What’s a girl in love supposed to do? In the movies, she has to defy Daddy someday. Yesterday was your day. The first of many, I suppose.” He sighs. “And we’re all in for more yelling. Great.”
“No, I’m done with it. No more yelling.”
He washes his hands and looks at me in the mirror. “Yeah, right.”
“Really,” I say, putting my things in the drawer as Rowan bursts in and squeezes between us. “It’s not worth this. I’ll . . . just forget about him.”
“Forget about who?” she asks. She slept through the fight last night.
“Nobody,” Trey and I say together.
Rowan shoves my shoulder. “You guys are so mean. Move it. It’s my turn in here.”
Trey and I escape. He takes off to meet Carter for his ride to school, and I cautiously flip on the TV while I wait for Rowan to finish getting ready. I watch a full five-minute weather segment plus commercials, with no sign of any explosions anywhere. And a bonus—the forecast changed, like it tends to do around here. Now the weatherwoman is predicting clear skies for two days.
“Big sigh,” I whisper, and I’m flooded with relief. I really think it’s over. Even if I’m about to be known at my high school as the weirdest freak on the planet, at least I’m not truly insane. And at the very least, if Sawyer dies, it won’t be my fault.
Jeez. What kind of sick person thinks like that?
Eighteen
On the billboard, I see Jose Cuervo for the first time in weeks. It’s the most hopeful-looking thing I’ve ever seen in my life. “I love you, Jose,” I say as we pass it. Rowan doesn’t hear me. She’s got her earbuds in, listening to something while she layers on more makeup in the sun visor mirror.
“Hey,” I say, poking her in the shoulder when we’re stopped at a light.
She pulls an earbud out. “What? Don’t freaking bump me.” She wipes lip gloss off her chin and starts over.
“Sorry. I just wondered how you’re doing.”
Rowan turns her head and frowns. “What?”
I laugh and shake my head. “Why are you suddenly so into makeup? Do you have a boyfriend?”
Her mouth opens like she’s going to say something, then she closes it and says, “No,” in a voice that doesn’t want to be questioned further. She puts her earbud back in.
“Okay.” I feel a little twinge in my heart for her. And then I picture us as spinsters living together forever, her being all sweet one minute and grouchy the next, her face perfectly made up just in case, and me leaving myself notes with sliced-vegetable lettering on the cutting board.
• • •
As usual, I ditch Rowan once we get to school—not that she minds—and keep my head down, avoiding eyes. Avoiding anyone talking with anyone else, because I’m pretty sure they’re talking about me. I don’t even dare take my usual glance to where Sawyer should be standing. Instead, I just stare into my locker and wait for the first whispers to reach my ears.
I grab the books I need and give myself a little pep talk, then slam the locker door and head to first hour. I keep my eyes on the floor, shoulders curved inward, and travel through the crowded hallway like a lithe bumblebee, zigging and zagging and curving around people, one purpose in mind—getting through the morning, one period at a time. Then the dreaded lunch hour, and finally the afternoon.
And I make it through okay, only once narrowly avoiding Sawyer when I see him coming toward me after school. I duck into Mr. Polselli’s psych classroom until he passes.
“Hi,” Mr. Polselli says. He’s grading papers at his desk.
“Oh, hi,” I say.
“How’s your paper coming along?”
I totally haven’t started it. “Fine.”
“What’s your topic?”
“Um, I think, maybe, I’m not quite ready to tell you yet,” I say with a guilty grin.
He laughs. “I see.”
“But I do have a question. About a . . . possible topic. If a person, like, sees visions or whatever, does that mean they’re, you know, insane, or crazy or anything?”