No word could have hurt me more . . . stalker. It was the same term thrown in my face when Topaz had ditched me in ninth grade. I had wanted to speak to the girl alone, to see if we could salvage our friendship, but she was constantly surrounded by a gaggle of popular assholes. Tapping on her bedroom window in the middle of the night had seemed a good strategy. I’d done a couple of practice runs, hiding in the shrubbery, working up my nerve. And then, I finally made my approach. How was I to know that Lara Wittman and Kyra Ma were sleeping over? That my looming presence in the night would send them into frightened hysterics? That I would theretofore be labeled a stalker—or more precisely a lesbo stalker—even though I had never been attracted to Topaz in that way.

It was like Freya had known the best way to wound me. While I’d never shared the exact details of my ninth-grade friendship gone wrong, Freya knew I was sensitive about my loner status. She knew I was afraid to put myself out there socially and have my desperation thrown back in my face. She had carefully chosen her words to cut me. She was cruel and heartless. Why didn’t that make me stop loving her?

All I wanted was to talk to her, but I couldn’t, not without perpetuating the myth of my obsession. I couldn’t risk driving down her street, walking past her yoga studio, eating at her favorite restaurant. I had to observe her from a safe distance. In fact, I had to borrow a pair of binoculars from Vik. If Freya spotted me, it would make everything a million times worse.

My life had become empty and meaningless. I considered Virginia Woolf–ing myself—filling my pockets with rocks and walking into the freezing ocean. I would have done it, if I thought anyone would care. My family would be upset, of course, until they realized that Eckhart could have his own room, then they’d be secretly grateful for the space. Freya would be flattered. She’d tell people that I was so obsessed with her, that I’d offed myself when she’d sent me away. I’d become notorious in death, the tall friendless stalker whose ghost haunts the harbor.