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I’ve put him so far behind me that it takes a second for me to put it together, like maybe he died in the past couple of days and no one told me and Branley is offering her condolences.

I start giggling.

“Why is that funny?” Branley asks.

I explain and she actually cracks a smile, the skin around her swollen eyes crinkling with the effort. “You know what I mean,” she says.

“Yeah, I know. Don’t worry about it.”

“Seriously. I made you feel the way I do right now,” she says, tears welling again. “And I wouldn’t wish it on anybody.”

I look at the water leaking from her eyes, the new flush creeping up her cheeks. “Me neither,” I say.

And I hold Branley’s hand as she cries.

55. JACK

The world is new and I am reborn in it.

Sure, spring always feels this way. It’s like we forget how to live over the winter. Our lungs do the job of pushing the stale cooped-up-in-the-house air in and out to keep us alive. We move from building to car to the next building as fast as possible, backs hunched against the wind, faces hid in hoods and hats, eyes on the ground as we go. Joy leaks out of your body in the winter and whatever isn’t sheltered is frozen solid.

But it’s more than the thaw that’s in my system and I’m not very good at hiding it. Even Park has told me to get that fucking grin off my face more than once. I’m stupid in love, and broadcasting it onto everything I see. The grass is greener, the air warmer, the baseballs a brighter shade of white.

The senior countdown is in the single digits, Alex and me neck-and-neck for the valedictorian spot and loving every second of goading each other. I try to delay her in the halls with a long kiss, telling her that she doesn’t need to study, and she responds by biting my lip just enough to let me know it won’t be that easy.

“Get a room,” Park yells as he passes, arm slung around Peekay’s neck.

I throw a pen at him but he snatches it out of midair and I spot Branley ducking into a classroom down the hall, the bright sheen of her hair unmistakable. I can’t deny there’s a stab in my gut when I see her, a trailing wound left behind that smacks of guilt. I ignore it, focusing instead on Alex’s freckles, darker now that she’s been coming to my baseball games.

“See you tonight?” I ask.

“Girls’ night,” Alex says, shaking her head.

“You can see Peekay anytime,” I counter.

“I can see you anytime.”

I can’t argue with that. With Alex officially accepted into Hancock and Peekay going to the Lutheran school, it’d be selfish to keep her to myself now when I’ll see her as much as I want later.

“Okay,” I say. “I’ll figure out something else.”

Park’s been on my ass about going hunting with him before turkey season is over, even though I know we’ll probably just end up drinking in the woods. And I’m cool with that, but my phone vibrates in my pocket before the bell rings at the end of the day. It’s a text from Branley, which hasn’t happened in weeks. We had it out over the phone the day after prom, her hysterics rising and swelling so much I put her on speaker because I couldn’t stand it right next to my ear. But I deserved it and I knew it, so I let her anger break over me in waves and never argued with anything she said.

And she said some pretty terrible things. I was just using her for sex (I could claim the same), I never cared about her at all (I almost wish that were true), I was a player and a liar and a son of a bitch. And I have been those things, all of them. So I let her say them, and hoped this was how I paid my dues.

I’m expecting more of the same now, a last volley of hate that she needs to get out of her system before we can move past it. Instead it’s simple.

can we talk?

I don’t know. Can we? The truth is that I want to. Branley might have fallen in love with me slowly without my knowing it, but when she fell out, it was a firestorm from hell that eradicated our friendship.

Alex is in my blood and fills my mind. I’d like to say that my whole heart is hers as well, but there’s a corner of it that belongs to Branley by right. A part filled with firecrackers and crawdads and my childhood. My thumbs move across the keypad.

what’s up?

Wnt to tell u I’m stl going 2 Hancock. Nvr wuz 4 u. They’ve got a gd RN prgm.

They do have a good RN program, and Branley would make an excellent nurse. But I don’t know how much I’m supposed to say right now.