“I am, right now. It’s not horrible.” It’s weird, trying to convince Zander that living with my mother wouldn’t be so bad. But really, this summer has been tolerable. She’s stayed out of my way, mostly. But she’s not staying, so I don’t know why I’m trying to convince anyone it’s an option.

“Why the change of heart? Is it Emerson? You’d stay with her for him?”

“I was going to stay for you.”

“That’s different,” he says.

“You do know I have friends, right? Emma isn’t exactly thrilled about senior year without her best friend. She wasn’t quite as quick to abandon me, you know? And yes, there’s Aiden.” Maybe.

Zander doesn’t say anything, he’s just looking out at the water, resigned. Maybe, like me, he’s thinking about all of the things I have in my life now that aren’t him.

“Are you going to tell your parents?” I ask.

His face looks pained. “Do I have to?”

“Yes. You do.”

There’s a long stretch of silence. Zander pulls up the anchor and starts the engine. The smell of gasoline fills the air as it rumbles to life and bubbles kick up around it. We’re slowing down, drifting toward the shore, when he speaks again. “You’re really dating him?”

I don’t really have it in me to admit to my ex-boyfriend that I may have been dumped (again) just yesterday. “I really am.”

“He’s off the rails, Liv. You want to be part of his meltdown?”

“You’re seriously going to give me dating advice? That was all start-of-summer rumors, anyway. He’s just going through some stuff. Cut him some slack.”

Zander grunts. “For torching my senior season before it even starts? Not likely.”

“He can’t help it. He’d play if he could.”

“So why doesn’t he?”

I shake my head. “He just can’t, okay? Give him a break.” If I’m not going to be here senior year, maybe I can at least make Aiden’s a little easier.

“Tell me, and I will.”

AIDEN

I hate waiting rooms. Especially Dr. Shah’s, because it’s basically a giant rectangular senior center. Except there’s no bingo or crafts. There are sugar-free cookies. The three women sitting across from me all have matching gray hair with tight curls and those solid-colored pants that people over seventy are required to wear. They must be in their eighties—I’m bringing down the median age big-time. And they all give me these judgy old-people glances, staring at my shaking foot like “Just wait, kid, someday you’ll be old. Then you’ll have a reason to be so fidgety.” And I get it, things suck when you get old. But also, my vision has been fucking horrible.