“If it weren’t at his house, would you go?”

“No,” I said, again, quite quickly.

“Why not?”

I realized I couldn’t bluff my way out of this one, so I decided to just be honest. I took a deep breath. “Because, I don’t know what’s going on with this guy. And he’s kind.”

By the way she looked at me, she knew I was dead serious. “Kind?”

“Yes.” I might have even smiled for a quick second. “He seems very kind.”

“You don’t think you’re kind?”

I looked at her for a few moments, then tilted my head.

“Doesn’t matter,” I said three seconds before our time was up.

Chapter Seven

Chapter Seven

Liam

On Friday, Blake, Sam, Adam, and I walked home together after school. I still had Ethan’s jacket on, having been unable to find him all day. Also, there was the smallest of chances I’d purposefully avoided running into him, due to the fact that it was a very comfortable jacket. Plus, it kind of smelled like him, which I knew wasn’t something I should’ve be focusing on, but yeah, I’ve absolutely been focusing on that fact.

“Please come with us.” Blake all but begged me for the third time in under as many minutes, tugging my arm without letting go of Adam’s hand.

I started to say something, but Sam beat me to it.

“He doesn’t like Dean.”

“No one likes Dean,” Adam said. “I mean, I know you dated him and all, Sam, but—”

“He’s not the easiest person to get to know; I realize that,” she said.

“I don’t dislike Dean,” I lied. “I don’t even know the guy.”

Telling them why I didn’t like him would mean telling them about the text he’d sent me, which would ultimately turn into me telling my new friends about my familiarity with mental institutions—something I wanted very much to postpone for as long as possible.

“Then come with us,” Blake pleaded.

“First of all, the reason I’m not going has less to do with Dean and more to do with my parents leaving me in charge of my brother—”

“Bring your brother!” Adam suggested, earning himself agreeable nods from the lot.

“I also don’t feel like partying tonight,” I confessed.

It was almost completely true. Let’s say I was 91 percent confident about why I didn’t want to go to the party. Most of which I’d already shared with them; the other 9 percent accounted for the likelihood of running into Ethan and finding myself breathing with a certain degree of newfound difficulty I wasn’t too keen on experiencing on that particular evening.

“But we could use that your parents are out of town to our advantage and get high at your place before going over to Dean’s,” Adam said.