She looks down at our hands. “All right, then.” She laughs. “I like this kind of nothing. The two of you have been fighting this nothing for way too long. I’m happy to see that nothing is happening, finally.”

We walk the rest of the way to school like that, our pinkies linked together. We talk about the prank and try to come up with a few simple ideas that won’t get anyone into trouble, but none of them sound good enough.

“We’ll think of something. Write them down or text them to me if you have any ideas during the day,” I say as we turn into the Crenshaw driveway.

I spend almost the entire day thinking about the prank. How can I do something that will make the guys happy, and make sure we’re not letting down all the dads and uncles and grandpas, while still keeping our asses out of trouble? We don’t need whatever we do blasted across the internet for the whole world to judge.

And I’m not going to lie, kissing Elijah is taking up a huge amount of my brain, too. If I think about it hard enough, I can almost feel his lips on mine again. I know I have to try to push it out of my head so I can get through the school day without failing every single class, but all I want to do is daydream about it and plan when I can kiss him again. I’m finding secret hiding spots in every hallway I’m walking in, and inevitably my thoughts turn back to kissing Elijah. Over and over and over again in one of those secret spots.

I spend so much brainpower thinking about both these things that I miss turning in my homework assignment in calculus and have to backtrack during lunch to find Figg.

“Hey, I’m glad you’re here. I forgot to ask you last night if you could come over after practice this afternoon and cut the front grass. We’re looking a little shaggy at Casa de Ernie and Figg.” He laughs, pulling leftovers from last night’s potluck from his blue lunch box.

“Absolutely,” I say. “And, hey, I’m sorry I spaced out in class. Here’s my homework.”

“That’s not like you to forget to turn things in. You doing okay? You seemed okay yesterday,” Figg says, digging a spoon out of his box and tucking a napkin into his shirt collar.

I just shake my head and grind my teeth. I don’t know if I can talk about all this with Figg again. He always has outstanding advice, but sometimes I feel like I lean on him too much. “Eh, you don’t want to hear about all of this stuff.”