“Don’t be too late,” June told us, the severe-mom look back on her face.

We both nodded. “All right.”

“Have fun!” she trilled, turning back to her book and mug of coffee. (I guessed it wasn’t decaf, if she was really going to stay up until we got home.)

“See you later,” we called, and slid the doors closed behind us.

The night was warm, and the sky was clear. The flashing lights of an airplane went across the sky, and there were stars twinkling up there too, against the inky backdrop. It made me smile. I wanted to spin around in a circle with my face tilted up to the sky.

I could feel Lee grinning at me.

“Go for it.”

So I did. Laughing, I spun around in circles with my arms flung out all the way down the beaten sandy path between the shrubbery until I lost my footing and fell over into a bush.

Lee was laughing too, and jogged over to give me a hand up.

It wasn’t hard to find the party. It was a little past eight, but there were a lot of people around. There were coolers, and a couple of small campfires. People had dragged some logs round to make circles, and if they weren’t sitting, they were milling about.

“This is the dangerous, drug-fueled rave your brother warned us to stay away from?” I couldn’t help but ask incredulously, looking on. From here, it all seemed pretty tame.

As we got closer, I saw that the people there were mostly around college age, a little older than us. But there were a ton of kids our age too, and a few younger.

“Come on,” I said, grabbing Lee’s hand and dragging him toward the nearest cooler. “I’m thirsty.”

“What happened to No, I won’t drink at all, don’t worry?”

“I never said that. I said I wouldn’t get drunk. There’s a difference.” I bent down to grab two cans of beer out of the slowly melting ice and handed one to Lee.

“Hey, Lee, you made it!” We turned around and saw a guy walking up to us.

“Hey,” Lee replied, doing that weird half-hug thing guys do. “This is my friend I was telling you about, Elle. Elle, this is Kory.”

I sipped my beer. “Hi.”

“You guys good for drinks? Come on,” Kory said. “I’ll introduce you to some people.”

And he did. Kory’s group of friends all looked either our age or maybe freshmen and sophomores in college. I was kind of able to put names to faces, but I’d forgotten half of them within the first few minutes.

At one point, while we were talking to some of them, Lee stood beside me and slung his arm round my shoulders. He drained the last of his can and said, “I’m getting another drink—you want one?”

“No, I’m good.”