“So,” he said around a bite, “How are you liking Seven Hills so far?”

I shrugged. “Noelle is . . . you know—Noelle—but other than that it’s fine. What about you?”

“Could be worse, I guess,” he murmured. His feigned nonchalance wasn’t very convincing.

“What’s wrong?”

“I just miss home a little bit, is all.”

“Have you spoken to your parents yet?”

“No. Just talked to my sister on the phone for an hour or something yesterday. She’s the one I miss the most if I’m being honest.”

I didn’t have any siblings, but I could imagine how he was feeling. I called my parents almost daily, but I was still missing them like a phantom limb. To distract both of us, I said, “Hey, have you heard of The Chitter Chatter yet?”

“My roommate was talking about it.” Seth swallowed a gigantic bite of pizza.

“No one knows who’s writing it. That should be right up your lane, right? There’s so much mystery around it, it’s almost like one of your crime novels. Are you going to investigate the case?”

“What’s there to investigate? Someone’s bored and thought it would be fun to take the piss out of people. Can’t blame them, to be honest; I bet we’re going to be looking for anything to make us feel alive as well after a few months of private school.”

“We could always join one of the clubs Amelia is so enthusiastic about,” I laughed.

Looking up from his plate, Seth said, “You know . . . I may have done that already. Accidentally, kind of.”

I gaped at him. We had barely spent a moment apart aside from the evenings, and I had expected him to be spending them lazing around in his room just like me. “What? How? Which club?”

“The drama club.” Seth scratched at his neck. “I was in the auditorium on Wednesday before they came in and I helped them with the stage lights.”

“Jasper directs it, right?”

“Yeah. He asked me if I wanted to come to the next practice as well. I said yes.”

“I didn’t know you were a technician on top of a detective,” I teased.

“At my last school I was on the team that organized all the school events,” he explained. “It’s really not that complicated.

Jasper just didn’t have a clue what he was doing.”

Chuckling, I went back to my pizza. While Seth had scarfed his down in record time, I couldn’t finish it for the life of me. He gladly ate the rest of mine and leaned back in his chair when he was done, tomato sauce and a satisfied grin on his face. “This was so worth it. Honestly, for all I care we could get expelled for this and I wouldn’t be mad.”

I was about to tell him not to let Amelia hear that when Giovanni suddenly appeared at our table again. Staring at Seth’s empty plate, then back at him, he said, “Bambino, how are you still a beanpole? Why don’t you look like me yet?”