“It didn’t freak you out, watching them walk into the river last night?” I said.

“Not really. Ros is a good swimmer, and you walked in there, too.”

“It was probably stupid in retrospect,” I said. “We’re lucky we didn’t drown. What were they thinking? It could have ended so badly.”

“But it didn’t,” Touchstone said. “Look at the facts in front of you, Celia. They seemed really good this morning. They were up. They read about the plants. Sure, they don’t have a job, but who cares? It’s summer. Maybe swimming in that river last night was a rebirth. Maybe they really did just need a change of scene, and you gave that to them. Maybe they’ve finally returned to their original form. Maybe you can stop worrying about them so much and start worrying about something—or someone—else.”

“Maybe,” I said.

I tried, for the rest of the drive, to turn off the worry as he suggested, just enjoy Touchstone’s tour guiding, admire the way the forest came right up to the road, and lose myself in the curve of the river below us. But Ros had been at the forefront of my brain for half a decade, and forgetting them just wasn’t that easy.

Ros was new in fourth grade, and we met because they were seated at my cluster of desks. They had furious, explosive hair, olive skin, and a scowl, and when I first saw them, they were scratching out the latter two-thirds of their name as it had been written on their name tent, pressing with so much force they’d torn a hole in the paper. I was worried that year about not being in a class with Touchstone—they’d split us up for the first time in our lives, into separate classrooms that didn’t even have recess together. My parents kept trying to recast this tragedy as an opportunity to make new friends and take risks, though I saw through all of that. I was alone, and to make matters worse I was quiet. Though I’d come a long way from the days when I used to clam up entirely, my teacher last year had written on my report card: Celia’s written work is excellent, and her reading level is very high, though I’d love to see her speak up more in class. My parents were obsessed with this comment and had urged me that very morning during drop-off to speak up more! But speaking, for whatever reason, was harder than reading and writing, even though I knew the words were the same. Touchstone got me, but other kids laughed, made fun of me for using the big words I liked.

So then I found my name tent next to Ros. I couldn’t tell if they were a boy or a girl. It didn’t matter to me. I was drawn to them at once.