“Agreed,” Libby agreed. “One sucks.”

“One means something!”

“Agreed!”

Owen licked his lips. He swallowed. He wound the tie around his fingers, licked his lips again, then let it unwind. “I don’t know what you want from me.”

“I want . . .” Libby didn’t know either. She didn’t have a bow tie to fiddle with, so she rubbed her face in her knees. “I want you to be my best friend.”

“I am your best friend.” He said it without even thinking about it.

“I don’t want you to go to the dance, Owen.”

“That’s not fair.”

“I don’t care.”

“I’m not trying to abandon you or leave you behind—just come to the dance.”

“To the Snow Ball . . .” Libby said, considering it. (Well, considering considering it.)

“Come,” he said. “Put on a dress. Or don’t. Go to one high school dance. Mark it off your list.”

“I don’t have a list,” she said.

“Well, I do.” He reached over and put his hand on her forearm. That was unprecedented. When you’ve been someone’s best friend for three years, almost nothing is unprecedented—but this was. “You have to let me have a list, Lib.”

“I don’t let you do anything,” she whispered. “You do what you want.”

“Ha.” He didn’t laugh. “I do what you want.”

“But I thought doing what I wanted was what you wanted.” Libby didn’t understand why Owen was so upset. She was the one who should be upset! “You asked me if I wanted to go to prom,” she said.

He nodded. “I did.”

“And I didn’t want to.”

“I understand, Libby.”

“No, you don’t—I didn’t want to go to prom; that didn’t mean I was signing away all my mineral and property rights.”

“Be less weird,” he begged her. “Just for a few minutes.”

“I mean, I didn’t want to go to prom, Owen. I wanted to watch Star Trek.”

“I remember.”

“With you.”

“I . . .” Owen stopped. He turned on the bed, so he was fully facing her. He still had her arm. “I actually don’t know what you’re talking about now, Libby.”

“I didn’t know that was ‘it,’ ” she said.

“What? That what was it?”

She looked at her knees. “Never mind.”

“No—not never mind. Libby.”

“You should go,” she said. “A girl that you like finally said yes.”

“I asked you first,” he said. “You said no.”

“To the prom,” she said as quietly as she possibly could. “Not to you.”

Owen started to say something. Then he licked his lips. He tilted his head. He didn’t look at her. Then he did. “Libby . . .”

“You’re holding on to my arm,” she said.

“Do you want me to stop?”

“No.”

“If I’d asked you to this Christmas dance,” he said, “would you have said yes?”

“No.”