“I know you tried. You did your best.”

“My absolute best,” he says. “But you keep acting like that’s not good enough. That’s what you think, right?”

“No. Of course not. But if that’s how she felt…”

He paces away from her, then with his back to her, he says, “Then what? Just say it.”

“Then maybe we had something to do with her feeling that way.”

He turns around, a look in his eye that I know well. He means business. Any softness he had is gone now, back to the father I always knew. My mother shrinks into the couch, and that must be enough to satisfy him, because he turns away.

He takes his coat off the rack by the front door. “I’m going for a drive.” He opens the door. “I’m giving you some time to think about this. If you haven’t dropped this nonsense by the time I get back it, just don’t say anything at all.”

An annoying buzzing sound fills my room, but I just throw a pillow over my head. No, I do not want to wake up. It took me another hour to get back to sleep, and even then I woke up at least three or four times.

A cold wet nose nudges my arm, and she’s so strong she actually starts pushing me toward the edge of the bed.

“Fine!” I say in a hiss.

I sit up and press the stupid button to turn off the alarm. This is ridiculous. Zara tilts her head at me.

I am not in the mood this morning.

I grab a hoodie and throw on my tennis shoes. She runs out the door the second I open it. For a moment I think she’s making a break for it, but when I walk into the kitchen, I see her waiting at the back door. She’s pretty damn smart.

I open the door, and she runs out. This time though, she doesn’t run right to her doghouse, she starts running around the yard. I realize after a moment of watching blankly—it’s too early in the morning for me to think clearly—that she’s playing. Now it’s my turn to tilt my head.

She runs one way, stops suddenly, then runs the other way. It looks, strangely, like she’s smiling as she does it.

“Girlfriend, you have to pick a decent hour to play next time.”

Still, I walk to a stick a few feet away and throw it for her. She runs, stops to sniff the stick before picking it up, then brings it to me. I think she wants me to throw it again, but when I reach for it, she jerks her head away. Then she starts jumping around again.

I make a sudden move, like I’m going to try to take it, and she runs joyfully around. My lips curl into a smile. She’s so goofy. Goofy like Jackson.

I run toward her, and she runs the opposite way, but already my toes are going numb. Shoes would have been a good idea.

Giving up, I walk to the doghouse and hold up the chain. She brings the stick to me, and I click the latch onto her collar. She barely notices. When I walk away, she just stands there looking at me.

I look back once I reach the door, and she’s chewing on her stick.

I feel really good that I can make her life a little bit better. Like my life has a small amount of meaning.

I go inside and take a quick shower. By the time I dress and walk into the kitchen, my mother is awake and sitting at the table with a cup of coffee.

“Morning,” she says.

Once, I’d have hated her for being so nice. Why pretend? But after last night, maybe I can try taking her seriously.

“Morning,” I say, I say, then glance toward their bedroom. “Is he…?”

“Still asleep. He was up pretty late.”

“Oh.”

Of course I know that she was up late, too. Her cup of coffee. The fresh pot on the counter. This isn’t just her morning ritual. She looks…exhausted. At least I made it back to bed. She looks like she didn’t sleep at all.

She sips from her cup. “What are your plans after school?”

“Going to Jackson’s to work on the art project, I guess.”

“What about tomorrow?”

I shrug.

I guess she takes that as an opening, because she gives me a surprisingly bright smile and says, “Okay, we can go shopping.”

“Shopping…?”

“You’ll need a dress. You said so last night.”

Oh God. Shopping with my mother. That’s not what I meant when I said I’d need a dress.

I sigh. I guess there are a lot of things I need anyway. I’m still wearing the expensive but much too conservative clothes my parents had waiting for me when I came back home.

I want to ask her whether it’s worth the fuss knowing how Dad’s probably going to react. Oh, who am I kidding? Probably? I know he’s going to be pissed. He’s already about to blow.

But I can’t take it if she says I’m right. If she says we shouldn’t go shopping.

I want to get the dress. I want to go to the dance with Jackson. If that’s a problem for my father, I’ll deal with it later.

“Okay,” I say. I grab my bag and head for the door.

“Have a good day,” she calls sweetly.

Well, that was interesting. I always wondered where I got my rebel streak when my mom’s such a pushover, but the way she’s acting now?

I’m not sure what she’s up to. I sense some kind of diabolical plan.

I sit next to Jackson on the bus, and even though nothing seems any different between us, it’s impossible to ignore the whispers around us that say we’re a couple. Original.

I don’t really care what they have to say. I wonder if Jackson does, but he doesn’t seem to notice at all.

We walk into school together and sit at his spot at the bottom of the secret staircase. I mean, it’s not really a secret, but not many people go there, so that’s what I like to call it.

Jackson talks about his friends calling him last night, how he told them he was going to homecoming with me.

“How’d they take it?” I ask.

“They’re worried.”

“Because of me?”

He raises his eyebrow, like he’s confused by my question. “No. Because of what happened with my last girlfriend. They’d be like this no matter who I was going with.”

I nod, because I get it. “I kind of did the same thing.”

“What do you mean?”

“I told my parents I was going with you.”

“Really? How’d they take it?”

“Like your friends.” I shrug and leave it at that. It’s way too complicated to get into. “Guess that makes it official.”

His eyes light up in a way that makes my stomach flip. I like seeing him happy. Happy about me.

He really does make me feel like a normal girl. Happy. Innocent.

Special.

Then the bell rings. I drop by my locker first, then head to class. I feel almost like a real high school student. I know my schedule, I have friends (plural!), and I’m going to homecoming. I even did my homework.

Nasty looks and whispers aren’t something you ever really get used to, but you can certainly pretend. I have perfected my “fuck you” look, and people steer away from me for the most part.

The school day goes fast for me. Or at least, it doesn’t feel like a full year, which is an accomplishment. My new misfit group of friends sit together at lunch and discuss more random things like what country would we most like to travel to and who’s funnier, Tina Fey or Stephen Colbert.

Jen tells me she had something come up with her family, so she’s ditching my tutor session for the day. That’s okay. I figure I can do my homework alone for one night.

Or I could not do homework at all…

I nudge Jackson with my elbow. “We still on for later?”

His eyes light up. “You know it. Why?”

“I might be available a little earlier than expected.” I nod to Jen. “She’s ditching me today.”

“Hey!” she says. “I’m not ditching anyone.” I give her a quick wink, and she blushes.

“But now I’m free right after school.”

“Awesome!” he says, smiling bigger than I’ve ever seen.

Today I feel very far from the girl living with Luis in New York.

After lunch I have health, which is basically just a class about sex. We learn all about STDs and pregnancy and all the things they try to teach us to keep us from having sex. I figure I’m pretty well past that, so it’s not a class I take very seriously.