June took a breath and spoke, totally devoid of emotion, like she was reading off a grocery list. ‘I don’t like myself very much.’

How? I said that out loud too. ‘How?’ It wasn’t patronizing, but it wasn’t really meant to be encouraging, either; it just didn’t compute. How could a girl like that not like herself? And then after, without thinking, I told her. ‘You’re everything.’

June pretended not to have heard. ‘I just don’t.’

We sat there for a while, as the sun set. I made some joke about throwing ourselves into the water. The mood lightened after that. She ruffled my hair. We ended up finishing the trail, and wrapping back round past the frozen expanses of quicksand. We ran, jumped and dumped snowballs down the backs of the other’s collars. I think we needed to let off some steam. Things were different. They had to be.

On the way back, we passed the aspen I’d carved. I didn’t look at it again.

And back in the car, I clicked my phone to life.

They would not ruin this.

June asked if everything was OK. I said yes.

Chapter 10

Chapter 10

Heath lived on the good side of town. Realistically, the sprawling developments of middle-class houses meant all of Pleasant Hills was the ‘good side’, but towards the north the driveways grew longer and lawns grew wider and house fronts were concealed behind veils of intentionally positioned trees.

‘I’m glad you came,’ June said as we turned on to Longbrook: Heath’s street. ‘I was really worried you’d say no. You don’t strike me as someone who likes this sort of thing.’

I scoffed. ‘Why did you invite me, then?’

June thought for a second. ‘I wanted to see you,’ she decided, even though her hesitancy suggested she had wanted to say something different. Regardless, my neck tingled. I couldn’t help it. Even though I was kind of still recovering from the heaviness of our earlier conversation, any insistence that she wanted to be near me was enough to set my veins on fire.

The line of cars parked up against the kerb implied the party had already started.

‘Shit,’ June breathed.

‘What? What’s wrong?’

‘I didn’t realize it was so late already.’

‘That’s fine, right? We’re – I don’t know. Fashionably late.’ I didn’t want to let on how much I loved the idea of it: emerging into an already crowded room with June next to me.

She crushed her knuckles against the steering wheel until they cracked. ‘Yeah,’ she said, then parked. ‘OK. After you.’