Dedication

For my mother,

who instilled in me a love of words;

and my daughter,

for whom I hope to do the same.

Contents

Cover

Title Page

Dedication

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Five

Chapter Twenty-Six

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Chapter Thirty

Epilogue

About the Author

Copyright

About the Publisher

I’m slumped at my desk, fighting to keep my eyes open. A drop of sweat meanders down my back. It’s got to be eighty-five degrees in here, though it’s only October. When we complained, Mrs. Winger mumbled something about waiting for a custodian to come fix the thermostat.

Beside me, hunched over his desk, Icky Ferris stumbles over the words in Julius Caesar. We’re supposed to be reading in partners—but his monotonous tone, paired with the unintelligible Shakespearean language that gets English teachers all hot and bothered, makes me feel unbearably sleepy.

Heat is one of my major triggers—and, apparently, so is Shakespeare. Warmth crawls up my spine like a centipede. It reminds me of the time I was sitting in my dad’s car in August with the seat warmer accidentally on.

All the words in my book mush into blurry gray lines, and I know it won’t be long before I lose consciousness. The room starts to turn inside out, the seams pulling apart. I pick something in the room to focus on and end up staring at an inspirational poster with a picture of a kitten hanging off of a tree branch. The caption reads: HANG IN THERE, BABY! As I watch, the kitten’s face starts to melt off. I slip down in my chair.

There are certain signs I’m about to pass out: drooping eyelids, muscles gone slack like spaghetti, a blank look on my face. My classmates have seen it happen enough times to be able to tell what’s happening.

“Sylvia,” Icky hisses, and then he claps in front of my face. “Snap out of it.” I blink and focus on him. Icky has a mullet and an unhealthy obsession with firearms, but I like him. He certainly shows more compassion than most of the kids at my school. “You okay?”

By now, everyone’s staring. It’s not really a big deal anymore, me passing out in the middle of class, but it is something to break up this boring October day. There hasn’t been any new gossip since the drug dogs found a bag of weed in Jimmy Pine’s locker—and that was two weeks ago. I’d like to avoid losing myself completely in front of these vultures if at all possible.

I hoist myself out of the chair and approach Mrs. Winger, my English teacher. She’s totally engrossed in something on her computer—probably solitaire. She’s the only one who didn’t notice me almost pass out. Her big desk is tucked in the very back of the room so she can ignore us. Pair by pair, my classmates’ eyes drop away from me and go back to their reading.

“Can I go to the bathroom?” I make my words small and humble.

She doesn’t bother to remove her eyes from the computer screen. If she did, she might see that it’s me, Sylvia Bell with the narcolepsy issue, and remember she’s been asked to let me leave the classroom whenever I need to.

Come on. Just let me go. LEMME GO.

The room spins and my knees start to buckle.

“Can’t it wait until class is over?” Mrs. Winger’s voice is snippy, cutting me into tiny pieces she can easily brush into the trash. She moves a stack of cards with her mouse.

“Can’t your game wait until class is over?” I push a lock of pink hair behind my ear. I know it’s a bitchy thing to say, but screw it. It’s the only way to get her attention.

She finally looks my way, irritation deepening the lines around her eyes. “Fine. Go. Five minutes.”

I don’t respond because I’m already out the door. I should go to the nurse, but she’s required to notify my father of any episodes, and I don’t feel like dealing with the questions. Not today. I’m so tired. Sleep might stalk me throughout the day, but it evades me at night. Last night, I might’ve gotten a total of four hours of sleep.

On my way to the bathroom, I pray it’s empty. No such luck—when I push open the door, I see a girl on her knees in the last stall, alternately sobbing and retching. I recognize the silver flip-flops. It’s Sophie Jacobs, the only one of my little sister’s friends I can stand. At least she won’t tell anyone about my episode. She has her own secrets to keep, anyway, like the breakfast she was probably just getting rid of.

I lean against the wall and search the pockets of my hoodie for the little orange bottle—the one that’s labeled Provigil. My doctor prescribed it to keep me awake, but in actuality it doesn’t do crap. I’ve dumped out the Provigil and filled the bottle with cheap caffeine pills, the only drug that seems to work for me—and then only if I take about six of them at once. The Provigil makes me feel like I’m fighting my way through a fog, but the caffeine brings everything into focus. My hands shake as I fish out a few of the ovals and pop them into my mouth, even though I have a feeling it’s too late.

The toilet flushes, and the stall door behind me swings open. Sophie just stands there, glassy-eyed, wiping her mouth with the back of a trembling hand. Her glossy black hair has a chunk of something yellow in it. I have to look away.

“Gah, I’m glad it’s you,” she says. She comes forward and twists the one knob above the sink. Our school doesn’t so much have hot or cold water, just one temperature: arctic. She scoops some water into her hands and splashes her face. “I’ve been feeling sick lately.”

I open my mouth to respond, but all that comes out is this weird rasp. My head aches. The room darkens, and I press my palms into my forehead, sinking to the floor.

I can never get used to the feeling of looking through someone else’s eyes. It’s as if each person sees the world in a slightly different hue. The tricky part is figuring out who the person is. It’s like putting together a jigsaw puzzle— what do I see, hear, smell? Everything is a clue.

What I smell now: mildew and hair spray.

I’m in the girls’ locker room. Hideous pink lockers flank me on either side. The girl I’ve slid into pulls black ballet flats onto her orangey, fake-tanned feet. Her toes are painted robin’s-egg-blue with little daisies in the center.

Gym class must be over. Half-naked girls rush around, wiggling out of shorts way too skimpy for October, brushing their hair, discreetly swiping on powdery-smelling deodorant.

A few feet away, I recognize a blond girl sliding a pair of skinny jeans over her hips. She has a little white patch in the shape of the Playboy bunny on her hip, where she puts a sticker when she tans. The girl is Mattie. She is my sister and my exact opposite in every way. If she’s the pink glitter on your valentine, I’m the black Sharpie you use to draw mustaches on the teachers in your yearbook.

I feel my mouth open, and out comes the voice of Amber Prescott, my least favorite person in the galaxy. “Ugh. I just got the worst headache. It came out of nowhere. Do you have any aspirin?”

My mind races. How could I have slid into Amber? I wasn’t touching anything of hers. Was I?

Mattie fastens her silky ponytail with an elastic band. “Nope. Sorry. Anyway, it’s really none of my business if Sophie wants to hook up with Scotch. She can go around acting like a whore if she wants.”

“Personally, I think it’s disgusting the way she’s throwing herself at him. I mean, that’s not what a good friend does. She knew you had a crush on him.”

Scotch? As in Scotch Becker? The biggest prick in the junior class? The mere mention of his name makes me feel like puking. When did Mattie start liking Scotch, head quarterback and douche extraordinaire?

Mattie’s face puckers as if she’s eaten a whole box of Lemonheads, which it always does when she’s trying to act like something doesn’t bother her.

“Well, what am I supposed to do? I can’t force him to want me. And, duh, why wouldn’t he like Sophie? She’s . . . like . . . amazing-looking.” Mattie drops onto the bench and covers her face with her hands.

Amber slithers closer to Mattie and pats her back. “Don’t give me that shit, Mattie. Scotch is crazy for choosing that heff over you. I mean, Sophie can’t go five minutes without sticking her finger down her throat. Just because she’s lost about half her body weight doesn’t mean she’s not still fat inside. Guys don’t forget. She’s still Porky Pie from the sixth grade.”

Porky Pie. Sophie’s old nickname brings back memories, none of them good. Kids throwing oatmeal cream pies at her on the bus. The time in the computer lab when Scotch Becker pulled up the dictionary website and made the robotic voice say “hippopotamus” at her, over and over. I can’t believe Sophie would even speak to Scotch after the things he did to her in middle school. In fact, I can’t believe she speaks to Mattie or Amber. They only started hanging out with her after she lost weight, and even now Amber’s favorite pastime is thinking of new ways to torture Sophie. Amber is forever pulling crap like telling Sophie her (nonexistent) ass looks fat or asking if Sophie should really be eating that slice of pizza. It’s obvious she’s completely jealous that Mattie and Sophie have become such close friends. She’s seizing this opportunity to drive the two apart.

Mattie peeks at Amber through her fingers. “Do you really think so?”

“Don’t worry,” Amber says, pulling out a hot-pink cell phone. “I’ve got a plan to put her back in her place.”

“Sylvia? Vee! Are you all right? Should I get the nurse?” Sophie hovers over me, twisting her hands in worry.

The bathroom tile is cool against my cheek. I wonder when they last mopped it. Pushing myself into a sitting position, I banish the visions of squirming bacteria from my thoughts.

“Ugh, no. I’m fine.”

“Oh, god. Your forehead!”

I reach up and feel a huge lump.

Sophie tears several paper towels from the dispenser and holds them under the faucet. She gently compresses the cool, wet paper to my head. She’s so freaking maternal. Last fall, when she and Mattie shared a birthday party, she made a chocolate cake from scratch. She covered it with chocolate icing and M&M’s and wrote “Mattie” with the candles. Mattie gave Sophie a Twinkie on a paper plate.

Just thinking about that party depresses me. Sophie is so sweet, really, despite her friends—including my sister, who used to be innocent and kind but in the last year has turned into such a bitch. I blame it on Amber.

Poor Sophie. She has no idea that, right this second, her two so-called BFFs are talking shit about her. And evidently planning something to “put her in her place.” I want to warn her to be careful around those two, but how would that look—me bad-mouthing my own sister? Would she even believe me?

Sophie pulls me to my feet. I lean against the sink and pull the paper towel away to assess the damage in the mirror. My forehead doesn’t look too bad. I feel the bump gingerly. A minor contusion. Maybe my father won’t notice.

Sophie meets my eyes in the mirror. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

I turn to face her. Her shoulders are hunched over, her head bowed. Her legs are two sticks beneath her cheerleading skirt. She can’t weigh more than one hundred pounds.

“Yeah, I’m okay. Really. How are you?”

She gets this funny look on her face, and I’m not sure if she’s about to start laughing or bawling.

“It’s my birthday,” she says finally, shrugging. “Mattie hasn’t said anything. You can give this to your sister. I made it.” Sophie holds out a braided friendship bracelet, the kind you make at summer camp. It’s red and gold to match their cheerleading uniforms.

I can guarantee with near certainty Mattie hasn’t done anything special for Sophie’s birthday. Again, I’m struck with the urge to tell Sophie to wise up and get some better friends. Thinking of how to phrase my words, I push the bracelet onto my wrist so I won’t lose it.

“Sophie . . .” I say, taking a step toward her, but she ducks into the hallway before I can reach her, tears streaming from her eyes. I crumple the paper towel in frustration and aim for the garbage can. It misses by a mile. When I lean over to retrieve it, a dollar bill falls out of the pocket of my hoodie. It’s stained and almost torn in half.

Crap. That must be why I slid into Amber.

Suddenly it all comes rushing back—Amber running up to me before first period, waving the crumpled dollar bill in my face.

“The stupid pop machine isn’t taking my money,” she’d wailed. “Caffeine is urgent. Do you have change?” She was completely freaking out, enough to leave an emotional imprint on the money she was holding, enough for me to pick up on less than an hour later.

I’d found a few coins for her and accepted the dollar in return, which I stuck in my jacket pocket. I must have brushed against it when I reached for the Provigil bottle— just when I was feeling faint, just when I was vulnerable. If I put the money back in my pocket, I could accidentally slide into Amber again later.

Unwilling to take the chance, I use a paper towel to pick up the dollar, and then I toss it into the trash. I never want to be inside Amber Prescott’s head again.

I speed-walk past the student entrance and almost run into Rollins, my best friend, who has a tendency to show up at school about halfway through first period.

“Vee!” He laughs and grabs my arm. “Where you off to in such a hurry?”

“Back to class,” I say, turning my face away from him so he won’t see the bump on my forehead. It’s no use, though. Rollins sees everything.

“Hey,” he says. “Hey. Stop.”

I let him look me over, waiting for the inevitable questions. Things between us have seemed strained lately. It’s as if Rollins senses that I’m hiding something. He keeps pushing, and I keep pulling away. If only he’d just let me be . . .

Rollins shakes his long brown hair out of his eyes. “Are you okay? Did you just—”

“Mr. Rollins,” a smug voice calls out. “Little late today, I see.” Mr. Nast—“Nasty,” to the students— strolls toward us, his thumbs tucked casually through his belt loops like he’s in some kind of western. It’s the last face-off—Nasty the principal and us, the delinquents.

Nasty glares at Rollins, whose face has settled into a smirk. Rollins’s snarky attitude hasn’t won him any favors with the administration—that’s for damn sure. He gets busted once a week on average. It’s pretty much Nast’s hobby, trying to nail Rollins for smoking in the parking lot or cutting class.

When Nast sees me, his face kind of wavers. I’m a tricky one. With my strange disability and permanent hall pass, there’s not much he can do to me. Rollins, however, is a totally different story. I know for a fact he’s only one tardy away from suspension.

Rollins’s grip on my arm tightens for a moment, and then he lets go. He prepares himself for battle, crossing his arms across his chest and tightening his jaw.

I throw myself between them. “Mr. Nast, Rollins was just walking me to the nurse. I’m feeling faint.” I make my voice wobbly and grasp Rollins for support.

Mr. Nast looks from me to Rollins and back again. I see in his face that he doesn’t believe me, but there’s nothing he can do. Finally, he throws us a severe look and mutters at us to hurry up.

Rollins and I bustle away from him, arms linked, heading toward the nurse’s office. When we round the corner, we burst into laughter, and any tension there might have been between us before has dissipated.

“I never knew you were such a fine actress,” Rollins says, snorting.

“Oh, that wasn’t an act. I really am feeling faint,” I say, pretending to swoon. “I’m such a delicate flower.”

“My ass,” Rollins says, nudging me with his elbow. “You’re about as delicate as an AK-47.” His snicker fades as he catches sight of my forehead. “Seriously, though, what happened?”

I shake my pink hair so it covers my wound. “It’s nothing. I just passed out in the bathroom. But I’m fine. No big deal.”

Rollins can’t hide his worries, though he tries. His eyes narrow. “If you say so.”

I squirm. Concern makes me itchy.

“Look, I gotta get to class. See you later?”

Rollins nods. “Later, Vee.”

When I get back to English, it looks like someone released sleeping gas in the classroom. Almost everyone is draped over their desks, holding their copies of Julius Caesar at odd angles in front of their faces so it’s not completely obvious they’re asleep. Mrs. Winger is still absorbed in her game. She doesn’t look up when I ease into my seat.

Samantha Phillips, her hair framing her face in straight red sheets, eyeballs me from across the room. Her cheerleading skirt is yanked up to show off her fake-baked thighs. I can’t believe I once wore one of those skirts. I can’t believe I was ever friends with the girl who is now captain of the squad. Sophomore year seems like a lifetime ago.

She looks at my Oasis T-shirt and sneers. “Nice outfit. What is it, like, 1994?”

I give her a death glare until she looks away and goes back to inconspicuously tapping the screen of her iPhone.

My gaze falls on the crisp, clean copy of Astronomy: The Cosmic Perspective, which peeks out from my black school-bag. I had to order it brand-new to avoid the possibility of sliding when I flipped through the pages. People have emotional ties with books more often than you think, and I try to play it safe.

With Mrs. Winger so enthralled by her computer game, it would be easy to pull my book out and continue the section on black holes I was reading the night before. There probably won’t be any questions about black holes on the Julius Caesar test, though, sadly enough.

I turn to Icky. “What’d I miss?”

“Hmmm . . . Well, the conspirators stabbed Caesar. You missed about the only good part in this play.”

“Aw, crap,” I say, in mock annoyance. I lean over his desk, careful not to touch the book, and scan the part I missed. Yada yada yada, the conspirators surround him, Caesar is history.

One of the questions on the study guide: What were Caesar’s last words?

I look back at the book, searching for the answer. Aha! Right after Brutus plunges the knife in, Caesar says, “Et tu, Bruté?—Then fall Caesar.”

I think of Caesar going to the Capitol, surrounded by men he thought were his friends, only to be stabbed repeatedly in the back. And there’s Brutus, holding the bloody freaking knife. The only thing left for Caesar to do is die, thinking he’s such a shitty person even his best friend wants him dead.

Sophie’s face pops into my head. What will she think when she finds out her two best friends are plotting against her? On her birthday, no less?

People suck.

I shake my head, writing down the answer.

“Pretty sick stuff, eh?” Icky grins.

“I’ll say.”

The bell rings, and everyone jumps to life.

Lunchtime.

I sit in my usual place, underneath the bleachers, and wait for Rollins. From my spot, I spy an empty Coke can, half a Snickers bar, and a Trojan wrapper. Fumbling in my backpack for my lunch, I wonder who in their right mind would want to have sex under the bleachers. Maybe they did it on the football field and the wrapper just blew over here—not that that’s much better.

The brown sugar Pop-Tarts I packed this morning have crumbled to bits, so I eat the big pieces and then tilt my head back and dump the rest of the crumbs into my mouth.

I expect Rollins to sneak up on me and make a snarky comment about my ladylike table manners, but he doesn’t show. This is the third lunch he’s stood me up for. After a few minutes, I pull out my astronomy book and read about black holes in between swigs of warm Mountain Dew.

I’m in the middle of a really great paragraph about how nothing—not even light—can escape a black hole once it’s reached the event horizon when something above me clangs. Two people are working their way down the bleachers. I stick my finger in the book to hold my place and tilt my head up, annoyed by the interruption.

A familiar voice floats down to where I’m sitting. It makes me want to puke.

Scotch.

They sit down above me, and I hear another guy’s voice. “Dude, you have to check this out.” His tone is conspiratorial, like he’s got some drugs or a Penthouse magazine.

Quietly, I stuff my book into my backpack. Maybe I can sneak away without them noticing me.

“What is this? Where did you get this?” I hear Scotch ask.

“One of the cheerleaders sent it out this morning. Hey. Didn’t you bang this chick?”

Scotch snorts. “Yeah, once.”

Feeling like I’m going to be sick, I crawl toward the opening beneath the bleachers. Something sharp slices into my knee, and it takes everything in me to stifle my yelp of pain. When I look down, I realize I’ve cut myself on a broken Budweiser bottle. My jeans are torn, and blood oozes through the opening. I bite my lip and move toward the exit.

After emerging from my hiding spot, I risk one quick backward glance. Scotch and another football player are both staring down at a cell phone, smirking. My heart clenches for the poor girl they’re discussing, whoever she is.

In the bathroom, I clutch a wad of paper towels to my knee, but the blood doesn’t seem to be slowing. Though I’ve been avoiding the school nurse, it’s clear I’ll have to stop by her office. The beer bottle wasn’t exactly clean, and she’ll have some antiseptic cream to smooth on the wound.

Mrs. Price is sitting at her desk, rifling through papers, when I arrive. Her gray hair is falling out of a loose bun, and she’s wearing these glasses on a chain that make her look more like a librarian than a school nurse. She’s so engrossed in her work, she doesn’t even notice me come in.

A boy I’ve never seen before sits in a folding chair in the corner. He looks me up and down, his gaze pausing on the bloody paper towels I’m holding, making me feel suddenly self-conscious. He doesn’t look like the type of guy who goes for chicks with pink hair. In fact, with his perfectly tousled blond hair and green T-shirt stretched tight over his biceps, he looks like the type of guy who dates girls who resemble Victoria’s Secret models. Still, he sits there smiling as if he knows me or something.

“Uh,” I say.

Mrs. Price looks up, her eyebrows jumping when she spots the blood. “Vee! Another accident?”

“No biggie,” I mutter, avoiding eye contact with the guy. “It’s a shallow cut. Just needs to be cleaned.”

Mrs. Price frowns and pushes back her chair. She glides over to me and stoops down to examine my wound. “Did you get this during another episode, Vee?”

“No,” I say, shaking my hair over my face so she won’t notice the bump. If she finds out I’ve been passing out, she’ll have to call my father and he’ll have to call my doctors and they’ll ask about the Provigil and the whole thing will be a big pain in my ass.

Mrs. Price pulls on some latex gloves and tells me to sit down and pull up my pant leg. She wipes my knee with an alcohol pad, dabs on some Neosporin, and then wraps it with a clean bandage. The whole time, I am intensely aware of the hot guy staring at my bare leg.

Mrs. Price strips off her gloves and tosses them into the trash. She stands and looks at the guy. “All your records seem to be in order, Zane. What class do you have now? Vee here can show you the way. Sylvia, this is Zane Huxley. This is his first day.”

The guy steps forward and shakes my hand. “Nice to meet you.” He pulls a crinkled paper from his pocket and squints at it. “I’ve got AP psych with Golden.”

“Oh, good.” Mrs. Price claps her hands. “That’s where you’re going. Right, Vee?”

“Um, yeah.”

As we walk to Mr. Golden’s room, I keep my eyes straight ahead, though I can feel Zane’s eyes on me.

“So, Sylvia. Got any advice for the newb in town? Cool places to hang out? Teachers to avoid?” He reaches out and trails his finger along a poster that says STAR in bubble letters. Safe, Tolerant, Accountable, Respectful—all the things teachers wish students were, but we can’t always be because we’re human beings and not robots.

“Not really. Get salad bar on Chef’s Choice days.”

He laughs. “Well, that’s a given.” He unfolds his schedule. “I’ve got Winger first period. Have you had her?”

I risk a glance at Zane. His face is open and friendly and interested. To him, I’m a perfectly normal girl. Well, a perfectly normal girl with Pepto-colored hair. But still.

“Yeah. Actually, I’ve got her first period, too. Just don’t bother her when she’s playing solitaire, and you should be fine. She gets cranky.”

“Solitaire, eh? What about this guy? Golden? He cool?”

“Yeah, he’s really cool,” I say. “He’s young, which means he hasn’t burned out yet. And he always tells these weird stories, like the time he helped a woman give birth at the Omaha zoo.”

“Ew,” Zane says, but he looks fascinated.

“Yeah. So where are you from?”

A girl in a flippy skirt skips down the hall toward us, her eyes lingering on Zane, but he doesn’t even look her way. His eyes are fixed on me.

“Actually, I used to live here when I was little. But then my dad died and we moved to Chicago to live with my grandma.”

Awkward. It’s always so awkward when someone mentions death, especially when you don’t know them very well. Strangers always say they’re soooooo sorry when they hear my mother is gone, but it’s wrong that death is a loss. It’s something you gain. Death is always there, whispering in your ear. It’s in the spaces between your fingers. In your memories. In everything you think and say and feel and wish. It’s always there.

I know there’s nothing you can say to make death okay. It is what it is.

“That sucks,” I say.

He nods silently.

We’re standing in front of the door to Mr. Golden’s classroom.

“Well, here we are,” I say feebly.

“Try to contain your excitement,” he says, smiling as he pushes open the door.

The room we walk into looks more like a lounge than a classroom. Mr. Golden likes to rescue and reupholster couches and bring them in for us to sit on during class discussions. He’s decorated the walls with seemingly no rhyme or reason. Mixed in with the posters of Freud and diagrams of the human brain are old concert posters for The Doors and Jimi Hendrix. He even has a black light he turns on for special occasions. A large green plant that looks like it could swallow me hulks in the corner.

“Looks like we have a newcomer,” Mr. Golden booms. “Take a seat wherever. I’m not into seating charts.”

Zane folds himself into a beanbag chair. He’s so tall, his knees almost hit his chin. The girls who aren’t sneaking looks at him are openly gaping. A little seed of pleasure bursts within me when he looks my way and grins.

Rollins sits on an orange sofa in the corner, doodling in the margin of his textbook. I plop down next to him and pull out my notebook. Mr. Golden may let us sit wherever we want, but he draws heavily from his lectures when writing his exams. I got a C on the last one, so I figure I’d better actually try to follow what Mr. Golden is saying about classical conditioning.

“Who’s that?” Rollins asks under his breath, nodding in Zane’s direction. Rollins doesn’t bother to take notes. He’s got some kind of photographic memory; he remembers not only what he sees, but also what he reads, hears, and even smells. Ask him what was for lunch last Tuesday, and he’ll remember just how nasty the burned meatloaf smelled in the hallways.

“Uh, Zane Huxley,” I whisper back when Mr. Golden pauses to blow his nose. “He’s new. I met him in the nurse’s office. Sliced my knee open pretty good.”

Rollins’s eyes dart down to my leg. “You okay?”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m fine. I just kneeled on a beer bottle under the bleachers. No. Big. Deal. Anyway, where were you during lunch?”

Rollins pauses before answering. I can tell he knows there’s more to the story, but I don’t want to rehash the conversation I overheard under the bleachers. It’s just too depressing.

He tugs his lip ring. “I was printing off the latest installment of Fear and Loathing in High School. My finest work, if I do say so myself.” Pride creeps into his voice. Rollins makes his own zine, in which he reviews concerts and writes articles about the suckiness that is high school. It’s completely do-it-yourself, literally cut and pasted from Rollins’s journals and drawings.

“Ooooh, can I have one?”

“They’re in my locker. I’ll give you one later.”

Mr. Golden launches back into his lecture. By the end of the period, I’ve covered a whole page with my loopy handwriting.

When the bell rings, Mr. Golden raises his voice. “Remember to read the section on the different theories of motivation tonight. There might be a quiz Monday, just so you know.”

I’m stuffing my notebook back into my backpack when Mr. Golden turns to address me.

“Sylvia, can I speak with you for a moment?”

Rollins pokes me in the back. “See you later.”

When we’re alone, Mr. Golden perches on a sofa and crosses his arms over his chest. I hover in the middle of the room, wondering what he could possibly want with me. I’m pulling an overall B in his class, despite the C I received on the last exam. I would be an utterly unremarkable student if it weren’t for my so-called narcolepsy.

“Sylvia, is everything okay?” he asks, his voice full of concern.

“Yeah,” I say, racking my brain for any reason for him to think things are not okay. I must be sending out some really not okay vibes today. “Why?”

“It’s just that I noticed you got a C on the test last week. The work you turned in prior to that test was of much higher quality. I don’t mean to pry, but is there something wrong? Did you not study for the test?”

If I wanted to, I could probably play the narcolepsy card and say I wasn’t able to concentrate on my studies. I’ve been having such a rough time, I tried my best, really I did . . . but that would be a lie. And there’s something about Mr. Golden that makes me want to be honest with him.

“Sorry, Mr. Golden. Guess I just forgot to study. I’ll try harder.”

He leans forward and lowers his voice. “Listen, Sylvia, if you ever need some extra help, I’d be happy to oblige. Why don’t you come in after school some night?”

I look down and shuffle my feet, trying to think of a polite way to say I don’t really need his help—the problem was that I didn’t open my psychology book for like a month.

“Oh, um. Thanks, Mr. Golden. I’m usually pretty busy after school, though. I’m sure I’ll do better on the next test if I just study a little more.”

Mr. Golden straightens up. “Well, just keep it in mind. I’m here for you, after all.”

I smile and nod before turning to leave. He follows me to the door and closes it behind me with a firm click.

After school, Rollins stands waiting at my locker, holding a stack of xeroxed booklets. “So what did Goldy want?”

“Oh,” I say, waving my hand. “He just wanted to know why I’m such a slacker. I told him I’m naturally lazy. Can I have one?” I gesture to the zines.

He pulls out a copy wrapped in plastic. “I know what a germaphobe you are,” he says teasingly. That’s Rollins’s explanation for why I don’t like to touch things other people have handled—I’m totally OCD.

I unwrap the zine and examine it. On the cover, it says, Fear and Loathing in High School No. 7. There’s a hand-drawn picture of a grotesque dog making its way down a hall lined with lockers, bags of weed and capsules hanging from its drooling jaws—a reference to Jimmy Pine’s arrest, I’m guessing.

“Nice artwork,” I say, admiring the cover.

He does all the drawing and writing in Sharpie, then goes to Copyworld to make dozens of copies. Every couple of months he comes out with a new issue. He sells them for a dollar apiece at the record store where he works, Eternally Vinyl, but more often than not he hands them out for free. Sometimes he rides the bus and sneaks them into people’s bags or pockets.

Looking over the table of contents, I see there’s an article about how the administration had no right to search Jimmy Pine’s locker without a search warrant; a concert review for a local band, Who Killed My Sea Monkeys; and an article about the hypocrisy of the kids in Wise Choices, the student group against substance abuse.

I turn to page five and scan the article entitled “Dumb Choices: City High’s Goody-Goodies Exposed.” Rollins cut out Samantha Phillips’s yearbook picture from last year and drew a beer can in one hand and a joint in the other. Samantha, along with being head cheerleader, is also the president of Wise Choices. I’m sure it’s only for her college applications—or to throw her parents off her boozehound trail. She’s been drinking wine coolers since middle school.

“We on for tonight?” Rollins stuffs the remaining zines into his backpack and zips it up, looking at me expectantly.

“Damn straight,” I say, trying to hide the surprise in my voice. It’s been our tradition to watch horror movies and order pizza on Friday nights, but he hasn’t made it the last two weeks. “It’s Friday Night Fright, isn’t it?”

I’m trying to decide what I’m in the mood for—The Ring or The Exorcist—when I remember that Mattie’s invited Amber over tonight. Shit. I’m so not in the mood to babysit a couple of cheerleaders.

“Hey, Amber Prescott is spending the night at my place tonight. Can we go to your house instead?” I mentally cross my fingers, already knowing what his answer will be, but hoping I’m wrong.

Panic rolls over Rollins’s face, then disappears, so quickly I’m not even sure I saw it. “Uh, my mom’s . . . painting the living room. The place is a mess. Drop cloths everywhere. Sorry.”

Since I’ve known him, Rollins has never asked me over to his house. Every time I suggest a visit, he makes up some excuse about his mom redoing the bathroom or putting in new cabinets or something. By now, his house must be a freaking palace, with all the remodeling they’ve done. I’m pretty sure his mom is really an alkie or a hoarder or something.

I shrug. “That’s okay. We’ll just banish Mattie to her room.”

His lips curl into a grin. “I’ll see you tonight then.” He slings his backpack over one shoulder and walks away.

After transferring my textbooks to my backpack, I slam my locker door and spin the knob. A couple of girls I used to be friends with pass me, whispering and giggling. They’re not laughing at me, though. They don’t even look my way. It’s like I’m a ghost to them, like I don’t even exist. I watch them hurry away, probably to cheerleading practice. Sighing, I head in the opposite direction.

When I walk by Mr. Golden’s room, I see something strange. A girl is sitting on a couch, and Mr. Golden is leaning over her. I can’t see her face—only a bit of long, black hair. It sounds like she’s sobbing. He looks over his shoulder and catches me peeking. Embarrassed, I look at the floor and bolt away.

I rush toward the exit, staring at my shoes and wondering what a crying girl is doing in Mr. Golden’s room after school hours.

As I push open the door, I plow into someone entering the school. At first, all I see is green T-shirt. My cheeks become warm as I realize who I’ve almost knocked over on my mission to put distance between myself and Mr. Golden.

Zane beams down at me. “In a rush to start the weekend, eh?”

I return his smile. “Isn’t everyone?”

“God, yes. My friends from Chicago are coming to see my new house, and we’re going to a show. You doing anything fun this weekend?”

“Oh, you know, the usual—cow tipping,” I say.

“Nice. Have fun with that. And try not to run anyone else over.” He winks.

“Just try to stay out of my way,” I toss back, grinning, and step out into the fading afternoon sunlight. The air smells of burning leaves. Only a few cars are left in the student parking lot. I wonder which car is Zane’s as I pop my headphones into my ears and trudge toward the sidewalk.

As I walk home, my mind keeps returning to the scene in Mr. Golden’s room. I wonder who that girl on the couch was and what happened to her to make her cry so hard.

A curious piece of paper is taped to our front door, flapping in the wind. As I get closer, I realize it’s a little square from a desk calendar. I rip it off the door and carry it inside to examine more closely. The date is circled several times in red marker.

October 19—today’s date.

Weird.

I remember Sophie in the bathroom earlier, saying Mattie must have forgotten her birthday. Is this Sophie’s attempt to remind Mattie? It seems out of character, but the desperate way Sophie was talking makes me think she’s not in the best frame of mind.

I stuff the paper into my back pocket. Sophie doesn’t need to give Mattie and Amber any more ammunition. If she just leaves them alone for a little while, I know it’ll all blow over. They’ll find something else to fixate on. They’ll all be friends again in a week.

I just stand there for a while, feeling the emptiness of the house down to my bones. Shadows stretch long across the floor. I hear nothing but the steady tick-tock of the grandfather clock in the living room. I am totally alone.

Mattie’s at cheerleading practice. Dad’s at the hospital. Mom is . . . Well, Mom hasn’t been here for a long, long time.

Everything about our house is pretty much the same as it was five years ago, when my mom died of cancer. Same faded curtains with little red cherries on them. Same old yellow wallpaper. Same cherry hardwood floor covered by an ancient red-and-gold rug. Same ornate silver mirror opposite the front door.

I step closer to the mirror. The girl I see looks wild with her bright-pink hair—rebellious and free. I wish I felt that way inside. I dyed my hair because I needed a drastic change from pale blond—my natural hair color is exactly the same shade as my mother’s. I was tired of looking in the mirror every day and seeing her, missing her.

Dyeing my hair couldn’t disguise the other parts of her that lived on in me, though. The way my laughter borders on cackling when I find something hilarious, just like hers did. The way my skin refuses to tan, no matter how many hours I spend in the sun.

And I know she had narcolepsy, too. I’ve inherited that unfortunate gene from her. I remember her falling asleep sometimes while watching television or during dinner. When she woke up, she’d have the strangest little smile. I’d give anything to know what happened to her while she was asleep. If she was like me. If she slid.

I don’t remember the first time it happened, but it was after my mother’s death. My father told me about walking into my room when I was twelve years old and finding me on the floor, unconscious. I was barely breathing. He couldn’t wake me up. He rushed me to the emergency room, but no one could figure out what was wrong with me. Eventually, I just woke up and was fine, like nothing happened.

The doctors conducted test after test. Eventually, with a lack of any better explanation for my periodic bouts of unconsciousness, they diagnosed me with narcolepsy—apparently it can start around puberty. When I tried to tell my father what was really happening to me, he started sending me to a shrink—a woman with bright-red hair named Mrs. Moran. She said I was dealing with the pain of my mother’s death by making up stories. Crying out for attention. My father thought that made sense.

So that’s when I started lying.

As time went on, I just got used to it. And I started to learn the rules. Like one time during a field trip when I was thirteen. I’d worn Miss Ryan’s sweater because the air had suddenly turned cold and I hadn’t brought a jacket to school that day. She warned me to not spill anything on it because her grandmother had knitted it for her. One minute, I was walking through the museum, studying the paintings on the wall, and the next—I wasn’t anymore.

I was back on the school bus. Suddenly a man came up behind me and circled his arm around my waist. He said, “Nancy, Nancy.” Miss Ryan’s first name. He spun me around, and I realized it was the bus driver.

He and his mustache came closer. His face descended onto mine, and his tongue went into my mouth. That was my first kiss. It was the most disgusting thing that had ever happened to me. It tasted like ashtrays and orange Tic Tacs. His hand slid under my blouse, and I prayed it would be over soon.

When I woke up, I was looking into a security guard’s face. I’d fallen down and hit my head. He let me go when he was sure I didn’t have a concussion or anything. I remember the moment when I handed Miss Ryan’s fuzzy sweater back to her. Something just clicked. I realized my sliding into her had something to do with her sweater. She had left something of herself—her essence—on it, and I picked it up somehow. I wouldn’t learn the word empathy until a couple of years later, but I understood the concept. It’s seeing life through someone else’s eyes. I had a gift.

Or a curse, depending on how you looked at it.

When I got onto the bus to go home, I couldn’t help but stare at the driver. He winked at me, and I hurried past him. For years after, I had nightmares about him biting my face off.

At first, it didn’t happen that often. Maybe every few months. But the uncertainty was enough to make me scared to touch anything. It was hard to tell which objects carried an emotional charge. There were the obvious things, the items people cherished and loved—like wedding rings or photos of grandparents—but there were unexpected things, too. A borrowed pencil. A library book. Anything someone was touching when they experienced an extreme emotion.

For a while, I wrapped my fingers with tape to keep myself from accidentally touching anything dangerous. But then I forgot and got sleepy and rested my cheek on a desk. I slid into an older boy stealing cigarettes from the grocery store. I felt his heart pounding beneath his big, black coat and the sweat under his arms. When my teacher woke me up, I stared into her face, terrified she’d know about the bad thing I’d just been doing.

But then I realized everyone was doing bad things. My teacher was sneaking drinks of liquid that made my throat burn. My sister was cheating during a math test. The mailman tucked packages into a special bag to take home. People were doing good things, too—writing thank-you notes, holding doors for old ladies, smiling at each other— but those people weren’t the majority. The fact is that most people keep secrets hidden behind their eyes.

Lately, I’ve been sliding more often. Once a month turned into once a week and then a couple times a week. Now, even if I can manage a few days without sliding, I end up exhausted and unfocused and even more susceptible to the slides than usual. It’s like the sliding is picking up momentum somehow. It’s like there’s a reason behind it. I just wish I knew what it was.

In my room, I throw my backpack onto my bed, but the stress doesn’t ease from my shoulders. Something is weighing me down. Maybe it’s the way those ugly words felt coming out of Amber’s mouth. Maybe it’s Sophie’s desperation. Maybe it’s how Zane’s smile made me buzz like there’s electricity coursing through my veins. I don’t know exactly what it is, but I need something to help me unwind.

I need music.

In my closet, behind my mountain of Converse shoes in all the colors of the rainbow, I keep a box of my mother’s CDs. I don’t know why I hide them; my dad doesn’t care that I have them, and my sister couldn’t be less interested in music from the 90s, but it’s like, if I keep them packed away, they’ll stay fresh—they’ll keep my mother with me just a little longer.

I push a Pearl Jam CD into my laptop and then crawl onto my bed. I retrieve the astronomy book and run my fingers over the cover. It’s black, sprinkled with peepholes of light. There’s nothing as gorgeous as the night sky. Nothing.

Flipping through the pages, I find the corner I carefully turned down to mark my place. Black holes. They’re so intense and sad. When massive stars die, their cores grow so dense with gravity that they pull other things in, suck them into infinity. Black holes seem impossible, like they defy the laws of physics, but there it all is, in black and white. I wish there were a textbook that would explain the phenomena of sliding to me.

The song “Alive” comes on, and my heart trips a little. I lean back against my pillow and listen to the words. It’s all about this kid finding out his father is dead. Even though the kid never knew his father, the death leaves a scar on him. An absence so all-encompassing, it’s there even in his happiest moments.

I close my eyes and wish I could tell my mother about my day. I’d tell her I’m worried about Sophie and how there’s a new boy who’s really kind of hot and how I think Mattie and Amber are up to no good. I’d tell her I miss her. I’d tell her I love her. I’d tell her everything.

A couple of hours later, Mattie and Amber spill into the kitchen, all ponytails and giggles and pom-poms. I roll my eyes over my glass of chocolate milk. Through the kitchen window, I see Samantha Phillips’s car pull away from the curb. The ridiculous thing is that, instead of just ditching me as a friend, Samantha hangs out with my little sister now, like she’s upgraded to a newer, shinier version of me. I suppose it was inevitable, since Mattie joined the cheerleading squad. And Mattie has way more in common with her than I ever did. I’ve heard Mattie spend hours on the phone with Samantha, debating the merits of thong underwear.

Mattie tosses her purse and pom-poms onto the kitchen table before raiding the fridge. “Hey!” She grimaces at me. “You finished the chocolate milk.”

She pulls out a bottle of Evian and twists the cap off before taking a long gulp.

Amber helps herself to a bottle of water and shakes it at my sister. “You don’t need chocolate milk, anyway, honey. Remember, we’re off sugar and flour.”

Mattie sticks out her tongue at Amber.

“So, what are the chances I can get you guys to lie low tonight?” I hoist myself onto the kitchen counter. “Rollins is coming over to watch movies.”

At the mention of Rollins’s name, Amber stands up straight. I can practically smell the pheromones coming off her.

“What will you give us to stay in my room?” Mattie, ever the negotiator, asks. Her gaze drifts up to the half-empty bottle of Captain Morgan on top of the refrigerator.

“There’s loads of sugar in rum,” I say, unable to keep the irritation out of my voice.

“Booze doesn’t count,” Amber announces. “Your body burns booze calories superquick. Especially if we practice our new routine a few times.” She swivels her hips and tosses her ponytail in either an epileptic seizure or their new routine.

“Please?” Mattie’s eyes are pleading. “We’ll just stay in my room. Won’t we, Amber?”

Amber shrugs. “Whatever.”

I sigh. If they actually stay in Mattie’s room, I’ll be free to enjoy the movie instead of having to explain the plot to Mattie, and Rollins won’t have a freshman in heat crawling all over his lap. Besides, if I tell them no, they’ll just sneak it anyway. Isn’t it better that they drink here, where I can keep an eye on them?

“Fine,” I say. “Just stay in your room.”

“Yoink!” Mattie grabs the bottle of rum.

Amber paws through the refrigerator until she finds a two-liter of Coke. “Don’t you have any Diet?” she whines, and I shoot her death rays until she looks away.

Armed with booze, Coke, glasses, ice, and a butter knife to mix their drinks, the girls bounce out of the kitchen and up the stairs. Just in time, too. At that moment, Rollins pulls up in his old Nissan Stanza.

I watch him climb out of the car and amble up the front walk, carrying something under his arm. He runs his fingers through his hair before ringing the doorbell. When I open the door, he holds his hands behind his back.

“Choose,” he says.

“Choose what?”

“Choose a hand. Right or left.”

I point at his right hand, and he brings it forward. I’ve chosen The Exorcist.

“Wise choice.” He nods.

“Mos def,” I say. “What’s in the other hand?”

He slowly reveals his other hand. He’s clutching a bundle of blue cloth. He shakes it out, and I see that it’s a T-shirt. I suck in my breath. The cover of The Smashing Pumpkins’ album Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness, with an angel bursting out of a star, is on the front. Mellon Collie is one of my favorite albums. I’ve been trolling eBay for this shirt for ages.

“It came in with a shipment of vintage T-shirts,” Rollins says. “Is it the right one?”

“Ohmygod!” I cry, jumping up and down. “I’ve been looking for this forever.”

Rollins laughs at my excitement. “Are you sure? I can take it back if you don’t like it. . .” He playfully tugs it away from me, and I slap his hand.

Rollins follows me into the living room and flops onto our plaid couch, in his regular spot. I lay the T-shirt carefully over the top of the couch, a cheesy smile plastered on my face, and pop the DVD into the player before throwing myself into the recliner.

“So who’s your dad operating on today?”

“Ah, I forgot to tell you. Conjoined twins.”

Rollins’s eyebrows jump with interest. “Really? Conjoined twins? Awesome.”

I knew he’d be excited at the prospect of real, live conjoined twins. There was one time last year when we were so bored that we went to Goodwill and bought a size XXXL shirt we could both fit into. We went to the mall, and everyone stared at us while we fed each other sticky buns and went up and down the escalator. Rollins even accompanied me into the girls’ bathroom and looked away while I went pee. I know it wouldn’t be fun to really be a conjoined twin, but we love the concept of it.

I fill him in on the details of the operation. In a weird way, I envy the soon-to-be-separated twins—assuming everything goes well. Soon they will be nestled in their cots, able to lead normal, uncomplicated lives. I wish there was an operation my dad could do to fix whatever is wrong with me.

“That’s intense. It’s so cool that your dad is able to have that kind of impact,” Rollins says, pulling a loose string off his T-shirt.

“Jared Bell saves the day again,” I say.

I’m unable to stop the dark feeling that passes through me. Yeah, my dad has a positive effect on so many lives— just not mine. Maybe if I saw him more than a few minutes a day, if that. I immediately feel terrible for the thought. Selfish. Sick babies are way more important than me getting to hang out with my dad. He’s a hero for being able to put right what nature made wrong.

I aim the remote control toward the DVD player to start the movie. The sky outside is just darkening in preparation for night. Rollins interrupts the movie every few minutes with a snarky comment. I pull a quilt tight around me, wrapping myself in the moment, the familiarity. This is the way our friendship used to be, before we started drifting apart. I miss it.

Linda Blair’s head is just about to start spinning like a top full of vomit when Mattie bursts into the living room, followed by Amber. Mattie bumps into the coffee table and giggles. Someone’s been hitting the rum a little too hard.

“Oh, hello, lovely sister. So sorry to bother you. But Samantha’s coming to pick us up, and we’re going to a movie.” She slurs her words slightly and laughs again.

Amber eyes Rollins hungrily. She plops down next to him on the couch and gives him a sly smile. The tiniest worm of envy works its way through the apple of my heart. I don’t know where it comes from, but it annoys me and I squash it by glaring at my sister.

“Mattie,” I growl. “You said you were going to stay here tonight.” My eyes gravitate toward Amber and Rollins on the couch. She’s batting her eyes at him, and it looks like he’s trying to inch away from her.

“Come on, Vee. All the Poms are going to be there. Do you want me to miss out?” She yanks up the volume on her “poor me” shtick, the one I always fall for.

Out of the corner of my eye, I see Amber moving closer to Rollins and hitching up her skirt. She lifts a single finger and reaches out to touch Rollins’s pierced lip. “I like your piercing. I bet it feels great—”

I interrupt Amber. “Fine, Mattie. Go to the movie. But you’d better be back here by midnight. I’m not covering for you if Dad gets home early.”

A blaring comes from outside, probably Samantha leaning on her horn.

Mattie pops a hip. “Don’t do me any favors. Come on, Amber, let’s go.” She pries Amber away from Rollins, and the two of them skip out the door.

The older sister part of me winces at the thought of letting Mattie go out, as drunk as she is, but the rest of me feels suddenly lightened. At least they’re gone. They’re Samantha’s problem now. And why do I always have to be the teenybopper police, anyway? I’m not the parent. I deserve a night to just enjoy myself, don’t I?

Rollins looks relieved, too. “Should we rewind? We missed the best part.” It takes me a moment to realize Rollins is talking about the movie.

“Oh, yeah.” I find the remote control under a pillow on the floor. I find the part we were watching before we were so rudely interrupted and push Play.

I settle back into the chair and pull the blanket up to my chin. After a while, my eyelids start to droop. I shake my head, trying to wake myself up.

“Vee? Are you okay?”

I hold up a finger and take deep breaths, but it does no good. I feel that I’m about to go. Quickly, I take inventory of what I’m touching. Chair, blanket, clothes. So I could slide into anyone who’s sat in this chair recently—my dad or Mattie. Shit.

I jump out of the chair, not wanting to slide into my father in the middle of some gross medical procedure, but it’s too late. I feel myself falling to the floor. Rollins cries out.

Wherever I am, it’s not the hospital. I’m not at the movie theater, either. I’m in a bedroom—a girl’s bedroom, it looks like.

The girl I’ve become cries as though someone ripped her heart in half. She sobs, clutching a lacy blanket, wiping her snot on it. Someone rubs her back. The pressure against her skin moves in circles, this way and that. It feels so good. It feels like everything I should have but don’t.

The sensation calms me, but it does nothing to stop the noise coming out of the girl I’ve slipped into. She wails like a banshee for ten seconds, then gulps in air until it feels like her lungs are going to explode. The pink walls, punctuated with framed pictures of ballerinas, seem to be closing in.

A middle-aged woman, presumably the back-rubber, comes into view. Her cheeks are full and flushed, and she reaches out a soft hand to tousle the girl’s hair.

This is what a mother is.

“Honey, those girls are no good for you. I’ve been telling you that all along.”

The girl just cries harder. I can barely see through her tears.

“Sophie,” the woman says.

The realization creeps up on me: I’m inside Sophie Jacobs. What could I have been touching that would have Sophie’s imprint on it? I suppose she’s been over at our house enough times. She’s probably sat in that recliner.

The scene in the locker room this morning comes rushing back to me. Amber and Mattie. Who else could “those girls” be? They betrayed her somehow, went forward with their plan to “put her in her place.” But how? What did they do to her?

“I don’t understand,” Sophie says. “How could they be so mean? They’re supposed to be my friends.” She wipes her eyes with the comforter, clearing my vision for the moment. Her mother hovers inches away. She hooks one finger under Sophie’s chin and tilts her head up, looks her straight in the eye.

“Sophie, listen to me. True friends would never do what they did to you. Do you understand me? And on your birthday, no less. What kind of monsters do that? The best thing you can do is cut them loose. Be strong. You’ll be so much better off.”

What did they do? What did Mattie and Amber do that was so terrible?

Sophie sputters. “Mom. I’m not strong. I’m not.”

An image slices through my mind: Sophie, on her hands and knees in the bathroom. I wonder if that’s what Sophie’s thinking of. I wish I could reach in, pull out her thoughts, examine them like a roll of film. But I don’t have that kind of power. I am only a passenger. A witness.

Sophie’s mother speaks firmly. “You’re stronger than you’ll ever know.”

Sophie’s breath gradually becomes more even. Her mother holds out her hands, and Sophie grasps them. They feel soft. I don’t want to like it so much, this feeling of a mother. I don’t want to know what I’m missing.

“Come on. Let’s go have some chocolate-chip ice cream. Don’t think I haven’t noticed how skinny you’ve been getting.”

Sophie tenses. Again, I remember Sophie curved around the toilet. Something within her breaks. Her body relaxes, her decision made. She lets her mother lead her out of the room.

“Sylvia?”

Rollins’s face is inches from my own. I’m sprawled on the floor, and he’s leaning over me, his brow furrowed. He pulls me into a sitting position, and his fingers catch on something around my wrist.

Sophie’s bracelet, meant for Mattie. That’s what made me slide. She must have imprinted on it while she was braiding it. I slip it off and toss it onto the coffee table.

“What’s that? You joining the cheerleading squad?”

I rub my temples. “Ugh. No. That’s for Mattie. Argh. My head.”

Rollins rubs my shoulder sympathetically. “Twice in one day. You must be exhausted.”

“Yeah.” I sigh. A part of me, small but growing every day, wants to come clean to Rollins. I mean, Rollins knows everything about me. Everything but that. Rollins is ruled by logic, though. If I told him I slid into other people’s minds, he’d laugh at me.

Wouldn’t he?

Peering into his brown eyes, I wonder if I’ve misjudged him. Maybe I could tell him. Maybe I could make him understand.

“Would it sound crazy if . . .” I trail off, not sure where to go from there. I remember my father’s expression when I told him about sliding—as if I’d just said an alien had visited me in the night.

“I’m sorry,” I say, pulling away from him. “Really. I’m fine.”

Rollins looks disappointed. I feel like I’ve let him down. I know he wants me to open up, confide in him—but I can’t. I just can’t.

“I should go,” he says. He grabs his leather jacket off the back of the couch. I follow him out of the living room and into the darkness of the front entryway, my mouth opening and closing like a fish. I’m afraid this is it—if he leaves now, our friendship will never go back to normal. I want to say stop. I want to say stay, but nothing comes out.

We stand near the door. Rollins’s face softens for a split second, and he reaches out and gently brushes my hair back, revealing the bump on my forehead. I don’t like the way it feels, so exposed. Wincing, I push his hand away.

He shakes his head and turns to open the door.

“See you later,” he says, his jaw firm, and he disappears into the crisp night air. After a moment, his car flares to life and roars away. I stand there, watching his taillights get smaller and smaller. There’s a bitter taste in my mouth. Finally, I hit the switch for the porch light so my sister will be able to see when she gets home.

I wander into the middle of my room and just stand there for a minute, not knowing what to do with myself. There’s something about being alone on a Friday night— it’s more lonely than any other night, I think. It’s like my loserishness has been highlighted by the simple fact that I’m standing here by myself at nine p.m. on a Friday.

I have to put on some Weezer to make the space a little less quiet. I stare at the walls, at the Nine Inch Nails and Green Day posters hanging over my bed. They remind me of Rollins—he’d call me every time something he thought I’d like came in. “You and your old nineties music,” he’d say, grinning, shaking his head.

The way he walked out tonight, though—it makes me scared I’ve lost him for good. I’ve shut down his every attempt to find out what’s really going on with me. I know what Dr. Moran would say—I’m pushing him away before he has a chance to disappoint me.

I try to find something in my room from before we were friends, a hint at what my life used to be like, but there’s nothing. Finally, I turn to my closet. I push aside the clothes I wear every day and peek in the back. It’s like a time capsule—my old cheerleading uniform, the preppy sweaters I used to wear when I hung out with Samantha.

When my fingers hook the glittery purple gown I wore to homecoming last year, I yank my hand back as if from a cobra. The poisonous memories come rushing back.

On the first day of sophomore year, I felt this heady rush of possibility. Cheerleading tryouts were coming up, and Samantha and I pinkie-swore we’d both get on the squad. When we did, we celebrated by sneaking wine coolers from her older brother’s fridge.

My locker was right next to Scott Becker’s—before people started calling him Scotch. Samantha and I both had the hots for him. He was smaller then, with sandy-blond hair and dimples. He did this thing where he’d stare at me until I looked, and then he’d get all red and turn his gaze to the floor.

On the last Friday in September, he asked me to go to the homecoming dance with him. I thought Samantha would be excited for me. Okay, that’s bullshit. I knew she’d be pissed. But I said yes anyway.

If I could take back anything that happened in my life— well, besides my mother dying, of course—it would be saying yes to Scott Becker.

Samantha turned mean, getting the rest of the cheerleaders to turn against me. In health class, we did these PowerPoint presentations on sexually transmitted diseases. Samantha’s was about herpes, and she Photoshopped my head onto a purple dinosaur and called it the Herpasaurus Rex. Everyone laughed, including the teacher.

Samantha spread a rumor that I gave head to all the seniors on the football team. My phone number was in every stall in the boys’ bathroom. Saturday mornings, our trees were full of toilet paper.

Whenever a cheerleader cupped her hand around some-one’s ear and whispered a secret, all the while staring at me, I felt like dying. But to give in would be to let them win, and there was no way I was going to do that. I tried to make it seem like the rumors didn’t bother me. Like I didn’t care.

Only at night, when sleep was impossible, did I cry.

The weekend before homecoming, my dad took Mattie and me to the mall to look for a dress. He pressed a few bills, crisp from the ATM, into my hand and headed off for the food court. Mattie pirouetted and skipped by my side, but it wasn’t all fun and frills for me. It was war.

I wanted a dress that would stun, that would show everyone how little I thought of the rumors and pranks. It needed to bring the boys to their knees and the girls to their senses. It needed to double as armor.

At one end of the mall, next to Pretzels ’n’ More, we found a store called Tonight, Tonight. The dress jumped out at me from the window—a dark-purple, silky, sparkly thing. It reminded me of the stream in the woods behind our house, of water spilling over rocks and twinkling in the moonlight.

When I put it on, I felt strong in a way I’d never felt before. I felt like someone else, someone older and wiser, someone who knew what she wanted out of life. The front came down dangerously low, skimming the tops of my barely-there breasts, but the saleslady pulled out these chicken-cutlet things and stuffed them in my bra, and it was like I had bloomed.

When we got home, I tried my dress on and sashayed down the stairs like a princess. I could tell my dad wasn’t too crazy about the dress and the chicken-cutlet things, but he said, “I guess you’re old enough to pick your own clothes” and “You only go to your first high school dance once” and “You sort of look like your mother in that thing”—and then he stopped talking and went into his study.

A guy on the football team with a goatee drove us to the dance, but first he took us to Kapler Park and pulled out a joint. I said no to the pot, but I took a few swigs from the bottle of Cutty Sark Scott had lifted from his parents’ liquor cabinet. It made me feel the way the dress did—all warm and grown-up and free. When we all felt light and fuzzy, we headed to the dance. It occurred to me that the goatee guy probably shouldn’t be driving, but the liquor made me feel like nothing bad could really happen, and I didn’t want to seem like a baby.

“Come dance with me,” Scott whispered in my ear. I let him lead me out to the middle of the dance floor, and it seemed like the whole crowd parted to let us through, just like in a movie. A slow song played, and I leaned against him and closed my eyes. He smelled like pot and orange shampoo. It felt perfect. But then a familiar feeling crept over me—I was about to slide—and I mumbled to Scott that I needed to sit down.

“You want to go sit somewhere alone?”

I nodded and rubbed my eyes. I could barely stand up. By the time Scott maneuvered me to the edge of the gym, by the doors that led to the locker rooms, I’d already slid into someone else.

It was a strange feeling. I’d left my body, but I was still in the gym. It was just like my perspective had changed. The body I’d slid into was standing near the punch bowl, sipping sweet liquid out of a paper cup. Her beautiful pink ring flashed under the disco lights. That’s when I realized who I’d slid into. I was wearing Samantha’s silver heels, ones I’d borrowed long before our fight, ones that she’d said made her feel like Cinderella.

My ex-best friend watched Scott drag my body into the boys’ locker room.

My worst fear was coming true. When you abandon your body, you leave it vulnerable. Maybe Scott was just looking for a place to sit with me and wait until I woke up, but then why didn’t he just prop me up on one of the folding chairs set up along the perimeter of the gym? Or, better yet, why didn’t he find a chaperone and ask for help?

I was pretty sure I knew why, but I couldn’t stomach the reason. I couldn’t think about what was happening to my body without me to protect it. I desperately wished I could force Samantha to follow Scott, to punch him in the mouth, or even just to scream for help. But there was nothing I could do.

After a few moments, I saw a boy with long brown hair and a lip piercing duck into the locker room. He was in my Spanish class—a new kid named Archie Rollins. Samantha and I had laughed out loud the first day Señora Gomez read roll call. Who names their son Archie?

My panic grew. I thought of a book I’d read about a girl who got wasted at a party. Some random guy took pictures of her naked body and posted them all over the internet. Everyone saw—even her parents.

Come on, Samantha, I thought. I know we’re in a fight, but how can you stand here and not do anything? How?

That’s when I returned.

I awoke to sounds of a scuffle. My body was laid out on one of those uncomfortable wooden benches in the boys’ locker room, my dress around my waist. Two struggling figures became clearer until I figured out it was Scott and that guy, Archie.

Archie got a good punch in, and it caught Scott right under his chin. Scott’s arms pinwheeled, looking for something to grab on to, but there was nothing. He fell hard on his back, groaning and looking like he wouldn’t be getting up for a while.

Turning to me, Archie held out a hand. “Come on,” he said, his voice gruff. “Let’s get you out of here.” I let him lead me out of the locker room, up the stairs, and outside into the cool night air. He folded me into his car, and I let him because I wasn’t thinking about much of anything but how I needed a shower.

On Monday morning, I overheard a cheerleader whisper to another sophomore that I’d gone down on Scott in the boys’ locker room at the dance. “Who told you that?” the sophomore asked. “Samantha,” the cheerleader responded, “so you know it’s true. And then Scott yakked all over the dance floor.” They giggled.

“Scotch Becker,” they called him. To this day, he goes by a nickname he earned the night he tried to date-rape me. Every time I hear it, I want to vomit.

After Spanish class, I confronted Samantha. “You saw it,” I said. “You saw Scott dragging me into the locker room, but you just stood there and sipped your punch and didn’t do anything.” My voice was shaky, and I felt like I was going to cry, but I wouldn’t give her the satisfaction.

Samantha stood with her folder clutched to her chest, her lips pressed together. In her eyes, I saw a mixture of anger, regret, and fear. I could tell she was wondering how I knew she saw it all when I was unconscious at the time. She was afraid of me, of what I knew and how I knew it. She turned and scuttled away.

When I got to lunch that day, Samantha was sitting on Scotch’s lap. Everyone at their table followed me with their eyes as I grabbed a plate and filled it with some spinach leaves and croutons and ranch dressing. I sat at an empty table near the windows. That was when Archie—well, Rollins—sat down across from me. He had a bag of Doritos and a can of Mountain Dew. He looked at me easily, like there was nothing out of the ordinary, like he sat with me every day.

“What’s up?” he asked, and we’ve been best friends ever since.

I didn’t tell anyone what happened to me that night. Maybe I should have. Probably I should have. But I didn’t, and even thinking about talking about it makes my skin crawl. It seems easier to pretend it never happened. The problem is . . . it did happen. And I carry it around with me every day of my life.

I don’t even bother to undress, just lie on top of my covers, replaying my conversation with Rollins over and over again, wishing it had gone a different way. What if I’d told Rollins the truth? What if he’d believed me? Does the fact that I couldn’t be honest with Rollins mean I don’t really value his friendship?

I sigh and turn onto my left side. The Clockwork Orange poster on my wall is illuminated by the streetlight. I get into a staring contest with it, but it’s no good. The eyeball with the thick black lashes always wins. I haul myself out of bed and pad across the room, to the window. My mother’s old telescope waits for me.

She loved the stars. Even though she’d majored in English literature, my father said, she took so many classes in astronomy she was able to pick it up as a minor. Though so much about my mother seems intangible now—the way she smelled, the things she’d whisper to me before I fell asleep at night—this seems real to me. I’m able to look through her telescope and see exactly what she saw. It makes me feel close to her.

Stooping down, I look through the eyepiece. Despite the light pollution in our neighborhood, I’m able to make out Polaris, the North Star, and from that I’m able to identify Ursa Major and Ursa Minor. Mama bear and baby bear. There’s something so comforting to me about the constellations, the mother and baby, cradled in the sky for all eternity. I stare until the stars go blurry and my breath goes soft.

Something in my pocket pokes me. I pull it out and smooth it against my jeans. It’s the page from the calendar that Sophie taped to our door earlier. I start to feel woozy, like I might slide. Oh no. Not again. My vision pulses, and my knees go out, and I fall deep, deep down, into a hole.

I’m sitting at a white desk, a pad of fancy stationery angled before me. Words crawl like spiders across the page, flowing from the pen in my gloved hand.

Who am I?

And why am I wearing gloves?

The words I’m writing say: I don’t deserve this.

As I stand, I notice the pink walls and the pictures of ballerinas. Sophie’s room.

There is no sound.

I turn away from the desk, and I see the bed. It’s definitely Sophie’s bed, but it’s a different color now. Earlier, the bed was covered with a pristine white comforter. Now, the bed is dark maroon. And wet. So wet. There’s something on the bed. It is Sophie. Her inky-black hair frames her white face. Her arms lie helpless at her sides, a long slash in each wrist.

No.

No.

This isn’t happening.

That’s when I see what I’m carrying in my gloved hands. A long, silver blade.

Oh. Shit. Oh. No.

Who did this to her? Who did I slide into?

But, before I can figure it out, I am gone.

My eyes fly open, and I sit up, grabbing at my legs, my head, my face, to make sure I’m really back. The light from the streetlamp shines in my eyes, blinding me for a moment until I dodge out of the way. I pull myself to my feet and look around. Telescope, rocking chair, heap of dirty clothes. I’m back in my room.

What happened?

My eyes fall on the small piece of paper on the floor— the one I thought Sophie had taped to our door earlier. If she’d been the one to put it there, I would have slid into Sophie just now.

But I didn’t.

I slid into someone else. Someone bad. Someone with a knife.

The memory of Sophie and her open wrists spurs me into action. I have to call, make sure she’s okay. The only problem is that I don’t have her number.

Mattie and Amber do.

I dash out the door and down the dark hallway to my sister’s room. But there’s no one there. Her bed is empty, the wrinkled sheets nestled around no one. Mattie and Amber are still out.

I look at the clock. It’s nearly midnight.

They should have been home by now if they were just going to a movie. As I return to my room to find my phone, I wonder what happened to them. Most likely they just crashed at Samantha’s house for the night.

They’re fine, I reassure myself. Mattie is fine.

I dial Mattie’s number and wait. No answer. I dial again. No answer.

I make myself sit down and breathe. Just breathe.

For a moment, I think about calling my father. It’s odd that he’s not home by now. The only reason he’d still be at the hospital is if the conjoined twins are having problems, in which case I can’t really call him up and bother him.

What do I do?

If I look up Sophie’s home phone number, I can call her parents. The number on my clock says 12:03. It’s so late. They’ll be angry.

Shaking my head, I realize that of course I have to call them. If what I saw was real, someone has to help Sophie. Now.

I fire up my laptop and type in Sophie’s last name. Jacobs. There are six listings under that name in our area. I have no idea what her parents’ names are. I’m going to have to try each of them.

I call the first number. No one picks up.

On my second try, a groggy-sounding woman answers.

“Is Sophie there?”

“You must have the wrong number,” the woman says angrily, and hangs up.

Please let the third time be the charm. Please.

The phone rings.

“Hello?” a man asks cautiously.

“Is Sophie there?”

“She’s asleep, like I was just a moment ago.”

“Please, sir. Please go check on her.”

“What is this about—”

“Please, I don’t have time to explain. Please go check on her.”

I hear the man set the phone down. A second passes, stretching out into forever. Another second. Another.

And then the screaming begins.

I sit up, groggy and confused. After swiping my hand over my eyes, it comes away smeared with black eye makeup.

My alarm clock says it’s noon.

All at once, the night before rushes back to me like a bad dream. Blood on white sheets. Sophie’s blood. The screams. The terrible screams.

The phone had gone dead after only about a minute, but I know the sounds of terror will live in me forever. I tried to call back several times, but the phone line was busy. Sophie’s father must have hung up and called 911.

I’d sat up in bed for the longest time, chewing caffeine pills and waiting for Mattie and Amber to get home. I was determined not to close my eyes until I knew my sister was safe. But that’s the thing about sleep—you can’t avoid it forever. It waited until my defenses were down and sucked me under.

I trip over my blankets, racing to my sister’s room. It’s still empty. Where could she be?

I hear something down the hall—someone in the bathroom, retching into the toilet. I run to the door, try the knob, but it’s locked. I bang on the door.

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