“I wanted to,” I told her. “Shopping is my favorite.” Though we both knew that was extremely far from the truth—I avoid malls like the plague.

“Awesome.”

Honestly, how sarcastic she was made me like her more. Ten minutes later, I walked through the hordes of middle school girls, right beside Eliza, matching her stride for stride. She seemed to know exactly where we were going. Good. The last time I’d been to the mall was in the eighth grade, and I hadn’t really been there to look at clothes. Unless, of course, they were already on a high school girl.

Everything was exactly how I remembered it—sociologically, anyway. There are three kinds of girls who go to the mall: girls who look like they came from the gym, girls who stare down every boy they see, and girls who look like they can’t wait to get out of there. With a bright blue running jacket, Eliza fell into category number one. It happened to match the shirt underneath my black windbreaker. Color coordination-wise, we went well together.

“Let’s start here.” Eliza stopped in front of a bright store that was all windows. “This is my favorite place.” Really? I followed her into a loud, crowded room. Upon entry, my olfactory senses were struck by the overwhelming smell of candy apple perfume. And this is why I never shop.

I made a mental note to ease up on my spray deodorant.

“Hey, Eliza,” a deep, masculine voice said.

Eliza waved towards the manchild working as the cashier. “Hi, Dylan!” She shot him my favorite of her smiles and gestured to me. “This is Nick.”

“’Sup?” Dylan gave me a nod. I returned it and took in the cashier with one, swift glance. He was about Eliza’s height with jet black hair, and he looked too old for high school.

I watched the way Dylan was watching us, and how a few (only a few, but a few nonetheless) of the females among us made sideways glances at him and not me. For once in my life, I didn’t have a perfect record. That Dylan manchild-person had game.

Eliza’s fingers grazed my jacket. “Before you say anything, Maguire, yes. I come here often.”

“I can see that. What’re we looking for?”

Eliza perked up. I guess she liked that I wasn’t lingering on Dylan. “I need a long dress and a short dress. Formal wear. I’m going to pick some out, and you can tell me what you think.”

“Cool.”

Eliza started at the rack immediately beside us and did that thing every girl does when they look for clothes—walk past something, feel it, take a few steps, feel something else. Honestly, no one should ever take the first thing on a pile of clothes. Everyone and their mom has touched it.

I could not figure out how the store made its money. The outfits on mannequins looked like wedding dresses in a horror movie, and the colors reminded me of the leftover lollipop flavor that no one wanted. Wait a second . . . a really short, slick black thing hung in front of me. I smirked. I could picture Eliza wearing only that.