“I’m usually quiet,” I start again. “But I don’t know what’s happening to me. It’s like I don’t know what to do with everything I’m feeling right now . . . where to put it all. And it’s coming out in weird ways.”

Her eyes meet mine, then start wandering around my face.

“Not to say, I don’t get hype. I mean, when it comes to basketball, I’m like a different person. Or if somebody steps to me, now that’s a whole different story. I mean, I let a lot of shit slide, but some shit—” Damn, Rex. Go ahead and curse up a storm, why don’t you.

Her eyes return to mine, like she’s waiting for what else I have to say.

“I’m just finding it really hard to act normal around you.”

She bites the inside corner of her bottom lip, like she’s thinking, but she doesn’t say anything.

“But in a way, talking like this is making me feel more normal than I’ve ever felt,” I continue, words pushing up and out of me like, we got this. I sure hope they know what they’re doing. “It’s weird being quiet all the time. Keeping everything inside. It’s like nobody ever really gets to know me. I’m not gon’ lie, letting it all out feels weird, too. So weird. Man, I feel crazy-exposed. But in a way, it feels good. I want you to know me, Carli. Like, straight up. And I’m really sorry for things coming out wrong earlier. It’s just that this saying-how-I-feel thing is new to me. So new. Like, you don’t even understand.”

“I can’t even imagine you being quiet,” she says, her eyes searching me again.

“I know. It’s weird,” I say, happy she’s not done with me yet.

“I see you like the word weird.”

“What do you mean?”

“You just said it, like, five times.”

“Did I?”

“Yeah, back in the day-day-day it used to mean destiny, you know?”

“Really?”

“Yeah, it used to be spelled with a y, like w-y-r-d, but it got all messed up when Shakespeare— Wait, are you sure you want to hear about this?”

“Yeah.”

“Don’t say yeah just to be saying yeah. Because I don’t want to be sitting up here wasting all my breath if you’re really not that interested,” she says, and reaches into the right pocket of her jean jacket with her free hand.

“I’m one hundred percent interested,” I assure her. How could I not be? She’s trying to teach me something I don’t know.

She lets go of my hand. “Well, there were these three Weird Sisters, right,” she explains, opening what looks like a tiny box of movie popcorn. She taps the box against her palm and three light-yellow jelly beans roll out. “Want some?”