“Stop talking, stop talking,” she’s saying over Cary, who is mumbling something at her. “Just stop talking. Shut up. Stop. Stop. Talking—”

Their voices cut off abruptly. I step into the room and peer around the door, past the desk and supply cabinets and posters about knowing your body.

The cot is empty and they’re beside it.

Cary has Grace up against the wall.

Cary has Grace pressed against the wall.

I process this like a two-year-old with no life beyond Disney movies: he’s hurting her. Then I realize, no—not hurting.

Kissing.

Cary and Grace.

I feel a little Norman Bates standing there, watching it happen between them. The way their hands fumble and grope all over each other, the way he kisses her mouth and her throat and how when he kisses her throat she leans her head back, all the way back, like nothing feels better than his lips against her skin. And then she lowers her head. She puts her palms against his face and makes him look at her and my throat tightens for what’s in her eyes. I don’t think she forgives him but it’s like her heart is a little more open than it was.

It would be so easy for them to catch me spying, but they can only see each other. Grace kisses Cary and suddenly everything is just slow and tender in a way it wasn’t before. The energy in the room shifts. They’re kissing still, but now they’re really kissing. It’s so open and so honest and so end-of-the-world and I can feel it from where I’m standing. I feel the absence of it from where I’m standing. I don’t know how much longer I can go on like this.

Still here. Still here. Still here.

Cary and Grace.

I hear them breathing.

I move away from the scene slowly and then I’m in the hall, tears in my eyes. I run past LaVallee’s office, past the auditorium where Trace and Harrison’s voices now float out. I push through the doors to the gym and Rhys is there, smoking. The first thing I want to say is Cary and Grace have paired off but I can’t because it will make the thing I’m about to do worse, wrong. I calm down. Walk across the gym slowly.

“What’s wrong?” he asks.

I bite my lip and turn my head in the direction of the hall. He grinds the cigarette out and follows me out. I don’t look back at him.

I pick the locker rooms because they’re closest.

Once we’re inside he says, “Is it Cary?”

I shake my head.

“What is it?”

“Thank you,” I tell him.

“Whatever,” he says.