I roll my eyes but take off one mitten. Mittens are one of the reasons I love winter. More outerwear equals less physical contact. Normally. Unless you are Well, and then nothing will stop you.

“Two seconds,” I say.

“Fine.”

I take his freezing pinky in mine and shake one, two times without breathing.

“Happy?” I say, pulling away. It’s not so terrible when I know it’s coming. Which I guess makes Andrea right, which is incredibly annoying.

“Happy,” he says as the bus pulls up and the doors shoot open before it even comes to a full stop.

“Hurry up, kid! We’re late,” Dan yells, and Well hops onto the first step. He has just enough time to shout, “And good luck with your thing!” before Dan waves at me and pulls away. My thing. My meeting with my mom. Who I haven’t seen in two months. Who is probably only here because the court is making her. Yes, my thing. I gulp the dry, cold air. I’m going to need all the luck I can get. I spot Ginger’s Lexus winding down the magnolia drive.

Here we go.

The Good Cup is a small, out-of-the-way coffee shop that Well and I have gone to before to work on our English papers. It’s always almost empty, but today there’s a crowd. I’ve never seen so many people here before. The shop next door is having a holiday open house. Great. More people. More noise. More of all the things I didn’t want to manage today while also managing my mother. Ginger circles the small gravel lot, searching for a parking place in all the madness.

I picked this place because Melissa told me to choose a “neutral spot” and because the first time I came here and saw the walls lined with coffee beans, it reminded me of Bagels and Joe. But it looks like everybody in the world is trying to find a neutral spot today.

We are half an hour early, which was also my idea. Andrea says the sensory stuff is harder to manage in unexpected and/or high stress situations. I already knew this would be high stress, so I figured we could show up early, stake out the place, pick a table in the quietest corner, and get rid of as much of the “unexpected” as we could.

Once we’re inside, Ginger pushes her way to the back of the line while I make a wide loop of the room and find two tiny round tables toward the back. I sit. I tuck my mittens into my pockets and hug Mom’s guitar in its case between my knees. I haven’t touched it in weeks. But this morning, against my better judgment, I pulled it out and tuned it. It was like meeting an old friend again.