Page 7

“Right, when you’re at the White House and I’m in the poorhouse,” she says.

“Poorhouses don’t exist anymore,” I snap back.

“Really?” she asks. “When’s the last time you drove down Far Cry Road? Lots of poorhouses out there.”

“Okay, look,” I say, flexing my hands on the steering wheel. “I just want this to happen because—”

“Because you want to rip the polite off like a Band-Aid to take a good look at the wound underneath, but you don’t quite know how to do it. You’ve had a nice, comfy life. I haven’t.”

“Yes,” I confess. “Yes, that is exactly it.”

“And,” she adds, still eyeing me coyly, “if it goes badly you can always blame it on me.”

“Uh . . .” I waver my hand in the air, teetering it somewhere between being honest and getting what I need.

“Whatever,” she says. “I’ll take it.”

A sigh escapes me, and the breath I’d been holding comes out sounding a little more relieved than I care for.

“That’s it?” she asks, tucking away her pen.

“Well, no,” I say. “We need to put together a timetable, brainstorm, talk about episode topics, who wants to cover what, whether we’re each hosting our own episodes, or both of us are recording together. We’ve got a lot of work to do.”

It’s one of my favorite phrases in the world. I love having a lot of work to do.

“No, I mean like—that’s it? No strings attached? You don’t want to bang me, or anything?” Bristal asks.

“What?! No! I—”

“You hesitated,” Bristal says.

“I. Did. Not,” I say through clenched teeth.

Bristal rolls her eyes. “Listen, if we’re going to do this thing, you’re going to have to lighten up, or I’m going to poke at you until you explode.”

I straighten my spine. “I accept your conditions.”

“We’re going to have some fun.” She smiles at me. “At least, I am. You might just get an aneurysm out of the deal.”

“That’s doubtful, given the data and my age,” I tell her as she cracks the door open, letting in a cold finger of air. “Wait—we should exchange numbers. We need to get on this, right away. Can I text you tonight?”

I think she’s going to have another go at me, but Bristal just digs out her phone and taps my number into a new text as I recite it. Seconds later, a new message pops up on my phone. It reads:

An aneurysm can occur at any age. Check your sources.

It’s followed by 🤯, and as Bristal Jamison gets out of my car, I have the feeling I’m going to need to use that particular emoji quite a bit in the upcoming months.

Four

Highlighting the silver lining of having a drunken guidance counselor is not easy; pitching it to your parents—one of whom happens to be on the school board, and the other on the village council—is even harder.

“Excuse me, what?” Mom says, putting down her fork.

It’s spaghetti night, and I’m sure Bristal would be shocked to know that the sauce came out of a can, and the pasta out of a box from the local food pantry. Dad inherited the three-story brick mansion on what’s known as the “nice street” in Henley. He makes enough money that we get to live the American dream: two-car garage, a stay-at-home mom, and a cat. But we’re not as well-off as some people would believe. My car is leased, the deck on the back of the house needs to be replaced, and Mom and Dad have been leaning on me a little more heavily about applying for scholarships—state and national, of course. Not local. That would be embarrassing.

And we actually only own half a cat. We adopted Uneven Steven (who only has his two front legs) from the Humane Society after he got hit by a ditch mower a few summers ago. He came with a Pinterest DIY wheelchair for his back half and a lot of congratulatory Facebook posts about our selflessness. Steven is wheeling his way through the dining room when Mom delivers her follow-up invitation to repeat myself after I dropped my bomb for the evening.

“What’s that?” I ask, cupping my ear.