I know it was Julian who tip-lined me. He was standing right behind me after I broke the window. I have no idea if he knows that I know it was him. He asked me flat out as we stood there if I was breaking in to steal the car wash money we had just locked up in Coach Marcus’s desk. As much as I wanted to deny it, I was like a deer in headlights. I couldn’t lie to him; instead, I just pathetically nodded my head when he asked. Frankie had already started hiding her growing belly from her bad-news boyfriend, Ty, and the rest of Meridien, under long T-shirts and leggings.

“We need a fresh start. Your uncle Jacob has gotten me a job in Houston,” Ma told us as she put together the moving boxes.

I started to protest.

“I don’t want to hear another word about it, Elijah. Frankie needs to raise her baby away from that boyfriend and Meridien. This town doesn’t seem to be doing you any favors, either.” She handed me a suitcase and told me to start packing.

One day, we just left. Five AM disappearance. Like we were never here to begin with. That morning, I watched Julian’s front door, willing him to wake up and see us leaving. Watch us pack everything we owned into a small U-Haul and my mother’s minivan and drive away.

“Just go knock on his window,” Frankie said, loading another box into the back of Ma’s minivan.

I didn’t, though. I couldn’t.

I thought about Julian all the way to Houston. I thought about him when we unpacked our things in the shitty efficiency apartment Uncle Jacob found for us after we lived with him for two weeks. I thought about Julian when we moved into a slightly bigger apartment a few months later, Frankie’s expanding belly knocking things off the shelves. I thought about him when Frankie got too big to tie her own shoes, and I definitely thought about him when Coley was born, a mess of dark curls and a cry that could peel paint from the walls. I honestly just couldn’t stop thinking about him while we were away.

On the bus to Meridien just yesterday, I thought about Julian again. What it would feel like to put cleats on and play with him again. In Houston, football would have meant getting onto the field without him. But now that I finally have the chance to suit up with him again? All I feel is sick to my stomach.

· seven ·

JULIAN

I spend the day on the lookout for Elijah. I’m so focused on knowing where he is at all times, I’m barely paying attention in class. He hasn’t shown up to any of my classes by lunchtime, and all that’s left are US history and football.