“He’ll get over it,” I say. End of subject.

Only, Julien doesn’t take the cue. He asks, “Did you see his posts? They’re pretty depressing.”

Ugh, I guess I should see what they’re talking about. I go to Josh’s Snapchat to look at the stories he’s sharing. Broken-heart emojis, Olivia Rodrigo lyrics that imply that, while I didn’t cheat, I still betrayed him somehow, a slide saying “i don’t want to talk about it.”

“In all lowercase too,” I say. “That’s when you know it’s serious.”

So melodramatic.

“You could probably be nicer about this whole thing,” Julien adds. I’m starting to think he’s enjoying this.

“What am I supposed to do?” I ask all of them. “This was just a hookup, friends with benefits. When this whole thing started, we agreed that we’d tell each other if feelings were getting involved, and that if that happened, we’d stop it.”

This time it’s Hoon who says, after a beat of silence, “Yeah, but … you made him cry.”

I sit on the knowledge for a bit, a churning in my stomach stirring up every second I sit here. Then I say, “Okay, I’m leaving. I didn’t come here to be put on trial.” I leave my beer on the ground and start to walk away. If they want to make this such a huge deal, then they can do it without me here.

“No, wait …” Samuel stands up, racing over to grab my hand. This close up, I can see the peach fuzz on his face. “We were just talking. Don’t be a party pooper.”

Samuel most certainly isn’t drunk yet, but I can’t even tell if he’s tipsy or not. He’s almost always this bubbly, hyper, chaotic energy that’s honestly very exhausting on the best of days.

Then again, he’s one of six people at this school who go out of their way to talk to me. (Well … five people now.) I should probably do what I can to hang on to the friends I still have.

“No more Josh talk,” I warn, looking at him and then the rest of the boys.

“Yeah, of course. No more.” Samuel mimes zipping his mouth closed and throwing away the key.

The rest of the boys nod, except for Hoon, who also zips his lips shut.