A friend of a friend from another school who heard I would kiss any girl who needed kissing. Ginger-mint breath and brown hair pinned up, with a few wisps at her neck. We sealed ourselves together in her car, pretending that no one could find us in the overlook near the state park, like the windows weren’t just glass.

My mom looked at me when I came home, that narrow-eyed tweezer look, like she could lift this truth out of my soul as easily as she used to take splinters out of my palms.

It would have been one thing to show up for dinner with a forever-girlfriend. Mom would have been able to go to the basement and find a box for that, even if it wasn’t the first one she reached for.

This was different, so I kept it quiet. Which led to rule number two: no one who likes to talk more than they like to kiss.

Danny: Now

Icome back to June’s face, smiling, expectant. She drops the knife to the ground between our knees.

Her eyes are a soft, mossy brown-green. Her smile does things to me. Not the ones I usually experience when being smiled at by a cute girl. These are softer, like the clouds stretched out beneath an airplane.

“What did you see?” she asks.

“Not magic,” I say. “But I’m used to being a disappointment.”

“Disappointment,” Rush whispers. “Bitter and pulpy. It’s like chewing on a Popsicle stick after the Popsicle’s gone.”

I have no idea what Rush is talking about, but I’m starting to gather, one soft-spoken comment at a time, that maybe her brain doesn’t work like everyone else’s. Which makes me want to pull her aside and ask her more. I’m not sure about my brain, but my body definitely seems to follow its own rules.

I don’t think the rest of the Grays would appreciate being splintered, though. They seem like a package deal. So I give Rush a nod that I can feel all the way down my spine and say, “Yeah. I don’t want to turn into anybody’s sour old Popsicle stick.”

Hawthorn presses her lips together. “I think we should take her to the hermit.”

“Yes!” June claps, a quick little burst. “Hermit time!”

I have visions of an old man with an extra helping of beard, possibly to make up for a distinct lack of teeth. A man who lives in the woods, communing with trees and animals because he’s reached the limits of human bullshit.

I like him already.

“When the moon’s risen, meet us at the mother tree,” Hawthorn says. “The fallen one, where we met last time.”

I grab my bag and shoulder the ridiculous weight of five textbooks. “And moonrise would be . . . around . . . ?”

Hawthorn sighs as she digs her toes back into her sandals. “Nine thirty.”

The Students of Tempest High School: Now