I drive him the three miles to our neighborhood as he uses the glove compartment, the center console, his thighs, my head to pretend to play the drum solo to the music on his iPhone. No one would ever accuse my red Wrangler that’s just shy of two hundred thousand miles of being a smooth ride. When I got it the August after my sixteenth birthday, Declan called it my Pretty Piece of Crap. He’d managed to fix it up to run, but it’s been withering from his lack of attention, so it has trouble doing even that now. Every one of its parts rattles, and the wind blows steadily through the Swiss-cheese soft top. Kane has to yell to talk to me when I drive, so we don’t talk much.

I don’t mind that. I don’t mind the noise either. It helps me avoid thinking too much. I don’t want to think too much. Not today.

He yells over the roar of the engine to tell me that he won’t need a ride for the rest of the week. Baseball is beginning soon, and he needs to start lifting again to get in shape. Last spring, he made Varsity All-Stars. Somehow he was able to get right back into the swing of sports and after-school activities. Unlike me. His college application shines. Unlike mine.

We live in a gated community, which might sound fancy, but it’s not. Our houses make up half of the homes on the Fox Court cul-de-sac. The homes are tall and thin and right on top of each other, so they remind me of dominoes. Kane’s house is almost a mirror image of mine. When Declan and his mom moved in three years ago, the Mayflower truck got stuck in the throat of the roundabout. Thank God for trees, Declan once said, or we’d all know each other’s business.

Kane texts Luisa as I downshift and cruise into the court. “She’s insane, you know. How’ve you guys been friends this long?”

He has to know that we’re not friends anymore. I haven’t been friend material for anyone except the cocoon of my bed for a long time. I haven’t been a lot of things I used to be. “What are you talking about? You’re the one who’s been going out with her for years.”

“Not consistently. I can only take her in small doses.”