“I’m so glad. When we all got transferred here, me and a few other choir and band members came up with the idea. We all miss them.” He clears his throat. “I’m sure you know this, but before…everything…Jordan and I had gotten to be pretty good friends. He wanted to play the guitar for one of the vocal ensembles, so we started talking. I miss him a lot….” He trails off. I glare at the poster about the spring formal that’s taped to the wall behind his head. There’s a beat of silence, which I’m sure some people would describe as awkward, but I don’t care enough about this conversation to feel awkward about any part of it. Lee barely knew Jordan, except through me. I don’t even know what he’s talking about, saying they were friends.

Lee starts talking again. “Anyway. Yeah. With the memorial—we thought we shouldn’t forget, you know? We were like, this is important….You know, that day, when it happened, I was in the cafeteria. We were all so scared….” He keeps talking, but it sounds like a buzz in my ear, not like actual words.

“May, you okay? You look a little pale….” He reaches toward me, but I smack his hand away.

“DON’T!” It comes out much louder than I intend it to, and all of a sudden the kids passing us in the hallway are taking notice. Everyone is staring. I’m a freak, I’m a freak, I’m a freak. I reach down deep inside myself and slap tiny imaginary me in the face—tell her to get her shit together, take a huge breath.

“Sorry.” Plaster on another fake smile. Pull my body off the wall. “Sorry, just tired. Not used to waking up this early.”

Lee nods like Sure, May, but he lets it go, because who wants to push the subject with an obviously emotionally disturbed person? Not most people, and definitely not Lee Brothers, Master of Emotion and Propriety.

“Anyway, good to see you, May.” He’s backing away as he talks, like he can’t get away from me fast enough. “I gotta run….Good to see you.” He already said that, but whatever.

I wave.

At his back.

—

Fourth-period drama, and Ms. Kowalski’s hair whips around like it’s powered by an invisible tornado. You have to give it to her: she truly does not give a fuck. I can respect that.

Today she starts class late because a couple drama freaks have been talking her ear off in the front of the room—a bizarrely animated conversation full of dramatic gestures and mock fainting.