But when Vera looks at me the way she’s looking at me now, like she has something to say but doesn’t know how to say it, all that hope goes right out the window. Because there’s a storm brewing outside the little bubble Peak and I have made for ourselves, and there’s only so long we can ignore it.

Vera opens her mouth a few times but then just sighs and hovers nearby while I pretend to reorganize the new-release rack. I count the times she clears her throat, and after the third time, I push up from where I’m crouching, because I’m almost positive I want to have this conversation standing up. “Vera, whatever it is, just say it.”

She looks at me all surprised, like she thought she was being subtle or something. Which, maybe she was, but seventeen years of suffering through anxiety attacks while trying to act normal has gifted me with the ability to be oddly in tune with people. Also, it’s possible she wasn’t being subtle at all.

“It’s nothing,” she says, “none of my business.” But I can tell she’s not done, so I stand there, waiting, with my heart rattling around in my chest like a panicked bird.

“Actually,” she says, shutting her laptop. “You know what? No, I’m sorry, but it is my business.”

“Okay.”

“What’s your story?” Vera asks, narrowing her eyes, and I swear the floor drops right out from under me. “You’re a sweet kid, but you came out of nowhere, and you don’t seem to have parents, and you’ve got my daughter all—”

I knew this moment would come. But the words are dying in my throat, or I am, because I don’t know what to do. I promised Peak one thing, but my gut says another, and I’ve been turning it over and over and over, because either way, I’m betraying someone. I need to sit down.

shitshitshitshitshitshitshitshitshitshitshitshit

“Ridley? Are you okay?”

“Mm-hmm,” I force out, because if I open my mouth right now, I don’t know what will come out: hysterical laughter, maybe, or vomit. I look at the window, praying for a customer to walk up or park out front, for anything to save me, for the world to intervene and get me out of this, but there’s nothing.

“Did you know that a single cloud can weigh over a million pounds?”

I look at Vera, so shocked that I sort of see through the haze of panic and pull in a deep breath.

“Um, shit,” Vera says, opening her laptop up. “That’s the only one I remember.”

“What?” I croak out. Where is Peak? I wish Peak were here. Why does school exist?

“Dammit. Hang on, the Wi-Fi’s being slow again. Just . . . just take a deep breath. I’m almost there.”