I stand up with a sigh. “Honestly, Evelyn, I just can’t bring myself to do homework on the weekend. It crushes my soul,” I say with a hand over my heart. “And given the fragility of my soul in the first place—”

“Cham,” Evelyn says in a warning tone. “You know you have to pass this class to graduate, and go on Senior Volunteer Trip and move on with your life, right?”

I bow my head and knit my eyebrows together with the hopes of seeming studious. “Okay, I’ll try to get it done.”

Evelyn stands and walks me to the door. “Cham, you’re a teacher’s nightmare,” she says with a smile. “So smart and so unwilling to apply yourself.”

“I do apply myself, Evelyn,” I say as I grin and step into the hallway. “Just not to anything tangible.”

4

Days ’til prom: Still 100

TEXT EXCHANGE WHILE I’M TWEEZING MY ARMPIT HAIRS IN preparation for tonight:

A heyyyy

A Me and Hil are gonna get chasers and stuff but we’ll pick you up in a couple hours Cham!

I thought you guys couldn’t hang out after school? C

H Abigail’s just helping me with history!

A We didn’t think you’d want to come

H It’s sooooo boring

A lol asshole I’m a great tutor

H See you soon!

C

“Tell me the plan again,” my mom says when I come downstairs in jeans and a black tank top. My hair is still a little wet down my back. “I want to make sure you’ll be safe,” she adds, pausing with a book in one hand, the mop in the other. She’s going at the kitchen floor mercilessly, no stain left behind.

“Gene’s moms are letting him have this party thing,” I say carefully. “Actually, it’s not even a party—he’s just having some friends over, and then I’m sleeping at Abigail’s after.” She looks at me skeptically, then closes the book and places it on the counter: Caring for a Sick Spouse. When she turns toward the mop, I discreetly push the book to the far end of the counter, where pieces of mail collect and swallow each other. “She and Hilary are gonna pick me up any minute,” I add. “Besides, I can’t miss out on the stuff that senior year’s all about, or I’ll be put on trial for pathetic teendom. You don’t want to feel responsible for murdering my fun, do you?”

“I don’t know.” My mom frowns, plunging the mop into the bucket and entirely ignoring my joke. “Will there be drinking?”

“Drinking what?” my dad asks, wheeling into the kitchen. Then his head snaps toward the window. “Why is that neighbor up in our tree?” He points to the long barren branches. “Look, Cham.”

I look out the window at the beech tree, and then I look at my mom. Before, she used to fly to the window when he said stuff like this. Then she would say, in that tone that crisscrossed scared with exasperated, There’s no one there. Now she says, not even looking up from the wet marks on the floor, “Huh, that’s strange. I hope he doesn’t fall.”