“Yeah.” I scrub furiously at the same spot on the mirror. “But her mom won’t let me talk to her or see her. So I can’t send her photos of us with cat-ear filters to make her laugh. And I can’t sneak her romance novels with sticky notes marking the kissy bits. I…I miss her.”

Zeke shoots me a concerned look. I bite my lip and move all the way to the front of the hood. I will not cry. Not here, at the class car wash. Because I don’t deserve any sympathy, not from Zeke. Not from anyone else.

Shouts ring out across the lot. Distracted, I glance up. Did Bandit finally haul himself out of bed? A group of kids have abandoned their hoses and towels and are bunched together at the front entrance, around the umbrella and cash box.

Oh no. Not Bandit after all.

“My brother,” I blurt, my eyes darting to Zeke.

That’s all I have to say. “Let’s go.” He drops the sponge and grabs my hand. We sprint across the parking lot.

I don’t have time to worry that we’re holding hands. We push through the crowd, and then I’m faced with a scene from my worst nightmares: my brother, frozen in the center of all those people.

“Archie, will you go to prom with me?” Tessa Jones lays a sultry hand on his shoulder, blinking fake lashes that are completely inappropriate for a car wash.

“No, me! Archie, be my date! Please!” Nikki Ferris bounces up and down like an overexcited puppy.

“Um…” My brother darts his glance from one girl to the other. “I already have a date.”

Shayla Allan saunters forward, and the people part for her as though she’s royalty—because she kinda is. Queen of the junior class, that is. “No way, ladies. He’s mine.”

Archie shakes his head. Something’s not right, and he knows it.

He reaches behind his back, and sure enough, there’s a paper taped there.

Ask me to prom is written in big block letters. I’d bet all the money in my savings account that the handwriting belongs to Lee.

For a moment, my brother stares at the words, stricken. And then his face crumples.

A sharp pain lances my chest. I hate this. So much. If I could redirect those jeers toward me, I would. I’d suffer a million cuts, a million rejections, a million heartaches, if I could save my brother from this moment.

But it’s too late. Archie’s skin pales until he’s the color of the soapsuds. He gets shakily to his feet and walks rapidly through the bunch, his head held high.