Everyone else in the class is absorbed in their internet search assignment. They haven’t noticed Erma and me talking.

I cough again and clear my throat. My stomach feels like it’s on a roller coaster, it’s being tossed around and I can’t get off the ride.

“The Williams boy?” I ask.

Please be Gavin. Please be Gavin. Please be the boy I’ve wanted since I was eight years old, not his awful, horrible brother.

“That’s right,” says Erma. She winks at me and then digs around in her purse. It’s on the floor next to her chair. When she comes up she’s holding a cookie tin. She opens it and holds it in front of me. “Have an oatmeal raisin cookie. I baked them this morning.”

I look down at the pile of cookies in the red tin. How can Erma offer cookies at a time like this? My stomach is still looping around my abdomen. Doesn’t she realize there are two Williams boys? One is perfect and wonderful and everything I’ve ever wanted and the other is…Will.

She waves the tin under my nose, and the scent of cinnamon and raisins wafts up to me.

“Um, alright. Thank you.” I take a cookie chock-full of raisins from the top of the pile, then I force myself to take a bite, chew and swallow. “Mmm. Really good. Thank you.”

I set the cookie down on the table, there’s no way I’ll be able to force myself to swallow another bite. Not until I know. Is my soul mate the man I’ve always believed it was, or his awful, horrible, rotten brother.

“Miss Erma? Which Williams boy? There are two of them.”

“Hmm. Are there?”

She puts the lid back on the cookie tin and pops it into her purse. When she comes back up, her black hair is messy. She pats it down and re-straightens her shawl. She’s fine boned and petite, and some people say she looks like a little bird. She definitely has the energy of a bird. And I’m beginning to see why Chloe always insists her great aunt is full of mischief.

“Yes. There’s Gavin and there’s William.”

My stomach rolls again and I press my hand against it. Please don’t say William, please don’t say William. She couldn’t, she wouldn’t.

“He just came back to town,” she says.

“Yes. Which one? Which one is my soul mate?”

Miss Erma studies me as if I’m missing the point. She gives me the same look that Chloe gives me when I can’t visualize one of her greeting card illustration ideas. I’d laugh if I weren’t so frustrated.

“Jessie. Dear. You already know who your soul mate is.”

“I do?” I try to swallow down the dry cookie crumbs still sticking in my throat. “Does that mean…?”