I wonder if she means weird at home or weird with me, but before I can ask, she stands up and gets on her board and flies down the bowl like a pro, like it’s nothing. Up the other side, too, her face a mask, like she’s bored. I laugh and clap my hands together, and then she hams it up with a big grin, wiggling her hips. I get on my board and try to do the same, but I’m shorter and less coordinated. I bail almost immediately, sprawling out at the bottom, but I’m good at playing dead, too. I stick my tongue out. I lay there while Lottie rolls past me, and I stare up at the sky. The clouds are gathering, pulling together in a big mass. I think about skies in all my favorite movies. Poetic fallacy. Doom. Foreboding. What are these skies telling me? The clouds dart about, avoiding my eyes like shifty assholes who owe you money and have no loyalty. I have that urge, that terrible panicky impotent wish to stop time. To stop growing up and older, to not worry about my friends or my family, to not have to keep up and be strong. Just for things to stop. Stay.

Her third time past me, Lottie mutters, loud enough for me to hear, “Get up, ya loser,” and I can’t help but laugh, the sound of my voice echoing in the cement bowl.

Chapter 4

4

Episode 66 2:30

A note on Mean Girls. Not just the movie, but the genre. Girls just seem to know how deep a small cut can be. So much can be gained or lost by a tiny faux pas, the wrong look, an oversight. We watch as our heroes and villains move around social minefields. Look at Heathers, for example. I mean, it’s hard to know who to root for, isn’t it?

Lottie and I meet to walk to school together the next day. She smiles and starts walking.

I keep in step and look over at her. “How are you feeling?”

“Hmm? Oh, fine.”

“Like, I mean, with your mom.”

She smirks at me, then says, “Yes, I know, Stevie.”

“Any updates?”

“Updates? Sorry, no.” She stops and turns to me. “Look, thank you for being so understanding, but it’s cool. I’m fine.” She gives me a little smile, almost like she feels sorry for me, then says, “Let’s just … We don’t have to talk about it all the time, okay?” and keeps walking.

“Um, okay.” I hurry to keep up with her. “It’s just that, like, I get it. My parents split up, so I know what this can be like.”

“My parents aren’t splitting up,” Lottie says, still staring ahead.

“Well, not yet, but—”

“I’m fine, Stevie,” she says, and that is that, even if I don’t believe her, and even if she’s being a bitch about it.