“You know, everyone has a thing.” He shrugs and begins to point at the other members in the group, picking each of them out. “Lydia’s thing is being smart and organized. Krystal’s thing is volleyball. Sean’s thing is—well, sleeping, and forgetting he has pockets …”

We all take a moment of silence as we remember the intensive search from earlier today.

“Daisy’s thing is knitting—and probably also dancing in a field of sunshine or donating to charity or something,” Oliver continues as Daisy pulls out a half-formed scarf from her bag, the pink wool unspooling over her lap, and starts finger-knitting. “And Cyrus’s thing is being attractive in a cold vampire way.”

Cyrus sends him a sharp, affronted look.

“What? You should be flattered,” Oliver says. “Daisy, tell him I’m right.”

Daisy lifts her head and nods. “Um, he’s right. The vampire comparison is definitely a compliment.”

“So what’s your thing?” Oliver prompts.

All of them turn to me, and my thoughts nose-dive off a cliff. Because what is my thing? What am I meant to be? Without modeling, there’s nothing special about me anymore. But that’s the kind of thing you confess to your therapist after at least ten sessions together, not in the middle of a casual conversation. Plus, if I tell them the truth, they’ll realize how unbearably boring I am, how my whole confident persona might as well be propped up by a few weak tentpoles, threatening to cave in under the slightest pressure.

I swallow, ignore the low, tumbling feeling in my gut, and—in an act of true desperation—glance out the window for ideas. There’s not much to go off of. The sprawling compounds rush by in dark gray and brown blurs, the mountains curving in the horizon, their shapes softening with distance until it’s difficult to tell where they blend in with the clouds … “Clouds,” I say, before the silence can drag on long enough to become suspicious.

Oliver blinks. “Huh?”

Cyrus’s brows furrow, and I feel my stomach twist nervously in response. He’s the only one here who knows enough about me to see straight through my lie. The only one who’d expect me to talk about modeling.

To stop him from questioning me outright, I rush to elaborate: “Cloud drawings, I mean.” Like this is a very real hobby that real people most definitely have. “I just find that they’re so peaceful, and there’s so much you get out of drawing them. Like, artistically. And emotionally.”