“Ava is so strong.” She pauses. “She gets up every day and faces her life with bravery. She inspires me, and no matter what anyone else says, I think she’s beautiful.”

She stretches out the final word into a breathy compliment that is clearly nothing but poison dipped in sugar.

After we open our eyes, Kenzie hugs me dramatically. Someone get this girl an Oscar. She dabs fake tears from her eyes as the circle disintegrates.

Asad hands me the end of a roll of masking tape to help him mark the stage for dress rehearsal.

“I hope you didn’t mind what I said.” He stretches the tape out between us, motioning me to stick it down on center stage. “I mean, someone had to say it, right? I figured it was better if I just got it out of the way.”

“It’s fine,” I tell him. “I liked the part where you pretended not to remember where my scars are. Spoiler alert: they’re ev-er-y-where.”

“I wasn’t pretending,” he says. “Straight up, at first, your scars were all I could see. Now, you’re just my friend Ava, who, by the way, was burned.”

I scoff. “Don’t feed me the ‘you’re not your body’ speech. I get enough of that at home and group.”

Asad rips the tape with his teeth. “Who else can say they have a shooting star on their skin?”

My fingers trace the scar that stretches across my collarbone and collides with the starburst tracheotomy scar at the base of my neck. I’ve always hated the way it cuts across my chest. Through Asad’s eyes, everything looks different—better.

“But you’re more than your body,” he says. “Just like everyone else.”

He heads up the auditorium aisle toward his lighting booth.

“Asad?” I half yell after him. When he turns around, I hold up the tickets.

“You free next Friday?”

I bite my lip as Asad smiles wide.

“I thought you’d never ask.”

33

Piper groans when I tell her about Kenzie’s center-stage apology.

“Tell me you’re not buying it,” she says before group.

“No, of course not. I’m sure she’s just trying to keep her enemies close and all that,” I say. “But she did give me the tickets. How nuts would it be if we end up being friends after all this? Not actual friends, obviously, but maybe we can coexist in the same room without seething hatred.”

Piper’s eyes go wide before she spins her wheelchair abruptly, so her phoenix faces me.

“Can you see it?”

“What?”

“The knife.”

I spin her back around by her chair handle. “Dramatic much? Besides, you used to be friends with her, so she can’t be all bad.”

Piper’s usual smirk falls and she leans in closer to me so Layne can’t eavesdrop from where she’s still laying out refreshments.