I unzip my backpack and pull out my laptop. While I’m stuck here, I might as well be productive. Whenever I’ve done work at a friend’s place, there’s always been a lot going on in the background. Finn is usually playing video games or smoking weed. Mark likes to tinker around with his dad’s old cars when we’re at his home.

Graham’s house is silent and clean. There’s not even music on. It feels like working in a library during study hall.

I glance up from the essay I’m typing when Graham walks back into the room. He takes a seat on the edge of the couch, right near where Sydney has settled. They smile at each other and then both start on homework. I want to laugh but don’t.

Cassia is standing near the opposite end of the couch. She’s whispering with the same blonde girl she walked into the cafeteria with on the day I approached her table.

I refocus on my essay before she catches me staring. I very much feel like the outsider in this studious group. Cassia and Sydney were right—there was no reason for me to come. If Sydney hadn’t been acting so strangely and the word party hadn’t come up, I wouldn’t have.

Movement catches my attention out of the corner of my eye, right as I hit submit on the essay. Cassia is sitting down next to me, instead of staying near the couch like I expected her to. It feels like a show of solidarity of sorts, and it’s also distracting.

I haven’t checked on Sydney and Graham once, mostly because there’s nothing they could be getting up to, sitting right here with everyone, but Cassia just a few feet away? Yeah, I won’t be getting any more work done.

I pretend for a little while, pulling out my history textbook and skimming the assignment chapters, then stand and stretch. “Where’s your bathroom, Graham?”

“Um, down the hall to the left. I can show you…”

“Nah, it’s fine. Thanks.”

I follow his directions, walking through the kitchen and easily finding the half bath located next to the pantry. Rather than head back to the living room, I walk out the back door and down the deck, ending up beneath the basketball hoop I spotted when we arrived. I shove my hands in my pockets and scuff a sneaker against the asphalt.

“There’s a ball in the garage.” I turn to watch, as Graham ducks into the garage and reemerges holding a familiar orange sphere. He hesitates like he’s considering tossing it, then walks over and hands it to me instead.