“No!” God, I should’ve prepared this better. I scrub my face with my hands and groan. “I’m sorry; I am doing this really poorly. Let me start over.” Another deep breath. “There was someone before you, and I didn’t understand my feelings, and you came along, and—you’re Chase. I have had a crush on you since I was in Little League with Kira and you were her string bean of a brother sitting on the sidelines. When you were interested in me, it kind of obliterated everything else. It helped me stop thinking about this thing I didn’t wanna think about. But I couldn’t stop thinking about it.”

He scratches the back of his head. “Lara, I gotta be honest—I don’t understand what you’re talking about.”

Aaaand I’m officially out of ways to dance around this. Deep breath. “It’s a girl, Chase. I like a girl. I was with a girl this past summer.”

“Uh … whoa.” For the first time since he realized this was the end of our relationship, he doesn’t look mad. He looks stunned. As stunned as I feel that the words just came out of my mouth.

“That’s exactly how I felt. I was so confused, and then you were into me, and I have liked you for so long. I thought if I had you, I could put her behind me. I wanted to put her behind me, to be with you. But it didn’t work.”

“I mean, this is the bisexual thing, right?” he says, and his voice does not sound kind. “Not being able to choose?”

I recoil as if Chase has slapped me, which it kind of feels like he has. “If by ‘thing’ you mean ‘stereotype,’ then yeah, it is. But this isn’t that. I wanted you, Chase. For fucking years, I wanted you. You know it. Everyone at Stratford knows it. You had years to see something in me. But you didn’t; someone else did. And I didn’t know I was—” I snap off. I don’t know how to say this without sounding stupid, without feeling stupid, without telling Chase too much.

“You didn’t know you were what?” he asks, and I don’t know how to read his voice anymore. It isn’t mad or tired or sad, but I feel all of it in those six words. “Bi?”