“What’s your name?” she asked, but I hung up. My cell rang again and I declined the call and then blocked the number. It could not have gone worse. Well, no, I guess it could have been Zeke and he could have told me to go jump off a cliff. But at least then I wouldn’t have had to make another phone call.

After a few minutes of pacing, of looking at my mom’s sneakers, I went to the next number, a 919 area code, North Carolina, and heard a voicemail message that wasn’t Zeke. I tried the Oregon number. Nothing. I tried the Georgia number and a boy told me that I had the wrong number. I tried a few that didn’t even seem plausible and got the same results. And I was out of numbers.

And there was this little moment, a moment I never allowed myself, when I imagined that Zeke might be dead, that he was gone, and it didn’t matter how long I searched for him. It was such a brief little window, where he went from missing to dead, and then I brought him back, that boy at the pool, his busted lip, eating that watermelon, because that was the whole point. Even if it was just in my mind, I needed Zeke to exist in order to keep going.

I looked up his mother’s name, not her maiden name but as Cydney Brown, in Memphis, and found it easily, a number I had seen many times, but I had never wanted to talk to her because I didn’t want that barrier between me and Zeke. It had always seemed like fate would bring Zeke into my world, but it had not. And now I needed him. I dialed the number.

It rang once and then Zeke answered. It was him, I knew immediately. Not the voice I remembered, but it was him. Why was it this easy? Why hadn’t I tried this years ago? And then I felt so sick, the whole summer rushing back, and I knew exactly why I hadn’t tried before.

“Hello?” he said.

“Zeke?” I asked, so shocked to hear him.

“Hello?” he said again, confused. “Who is this?”

“Zeke, it’s—”

“Frankie?” he asked.

“Yeah,” I replied, and I was crying. It had been so long, and just hearing him say my name, I felt the whole world stop for a second. I couldn’t breathe.

“What are you doing?” he asked. “Why are you calling me? What’s going on?”

“Zeke,” I said, but I still couldn’t get a breath. My chest was so tight. I thought I might be having a heart attack, but it was just a panic attack. It was just my entire life cracking open.