I may end up looking like a fool—again. I guess I can’t get much worse than the town whore who got attacked by the janitor after homecoming.

The point of this project is that I’m a freak, just like everyone else. If I’m not brave enough to risk more social embarrassment, how can I expect anyone else to be?

Mr. Harkins lets me use the theater stage again, partially because my project wouldn’t fit on those art tables, and partially because I want to keep it a secret. Even from Jackson.

He watches me every day as I leave art class to work without him, but a quick smile from me lets him know I’m not avoiding him. He showed me a new life. He gave me hope. Without that hope, I don’t think I’d ever have had the strength to let go of Luis, not for real, not for good.

Right now, I’m still stuck inside the looks and these concrete halls, but I’m not trapped anymore. I’m not chained. I can walk away from this school, these people, and live an actual life. I don’t know what I’d do, but I could do it. I believe in my future. I believe in the people who love me.

Most of all, I believe in myself.

And I only know that because of the boy who danced in the park with me, who believed in me when he didn’t even know me.

I finish the final touches of my poster…and decide that I’m not done yet. This isn’t enough. I’m not so good at telling people how I feel, but maybe I can show them.

Maybe Mr. Harkins is onto something. Using art, any kind, can help me change the things I want to change.

I curl up my poster, ready to unveil it on Monday morning, and run back to the art room to ask for one more thing from Mr. Harkins. I’m going to write three notes, but I want more than just notebook paper. I want them to mean something.

He gladly gives me three pieces of thick parchment paper and a calligraphy pen. I put the pen into my purse and press the paper inside my history textbook. I’ll write my notes at home this weekend. For now, I sit by Jackson and write a list of the objects I’ll need.

1. A chain

2. A jar

3. A picture frame

Jackson looks over my shoulder. “What are you planning?”

I wink. “It’s a secret. But I promise this is a good one.”

Chapter Thirty-Nine

Monday morning comes too soon. I’m nervous as hell, and not just about the poster. I’m nervous about all of it.

I drink a cup of coffee with my mom and pretend to be leaving for school. She sends me a quick farewell, and then she turns back to the magazine she was reading at the table.

My heart thuds in my chest, but I know I have to do this.

I place a picture frame, the glass jar—now filled with lightning bugs, lighting up and fading out—and a note on the kitchen counter, and then I walk out the door.

Inside the frame is a picture of her and me before I ran away. I was eleven, my unruly curls flying into my face, but in the picture my mother doesn’t seem bothered by that. Our cheeks are pressed up against each other, and we’re both smiling cheesily.

The picture doesn’t take up the whole frame though, and below it is a piece of pink paper I cut out from my old journal. It has my sloppy bubble letters I used to think were cool in middle school, and in the entry, I talk about the trip my mom and I took to the fireworks over Inner Harbor in Baltimore one year. I talk about how much I loved spending time with her and how I wished we could do more things like that.

On the parchment paper, I wrote:

Mommy,

It might not seem like it, but I’m still your little girl. I want to start over and have the life we should have had together, catching fireflies and shopping and talking about boys. I did love you then, and I still love you now.

I’m sorry for hurting you. I hope you’ll forgive me, too.

Love

Anna

I stop at our mailbox and hold a gift for my father in my hand.

His gift was harder to come up with. It’s hard to forget about everything he did to my mom and me. It’s even harder to accept. I don’t know if he’ll ever change. But I know now that people can. If he ever decides to, I want him to know I believe in him.

So in the end, I decided the simplest gift would be the best. I wrote a letter.

Daddy,

I’m sorry I went away. I’m sorry I changed. I’m sorry I grew up.

Sometimes you have to let the things you love be free or they’ll suffocate.

I hope one day you can accept me for who I am.

Love

Anna

I put the letter into the mailbox and then practically run to the bus stop. My heart pounds while I wait for the bus, and it hasn’t seemed to slow by the time the bus arrives.

On the bus, Jackson flops down next to me, and I jump.

“Whoa. You okay?”

I laugh awkwardly. “Just nervous about today.”

His eyebrows shoot up. “Do I finally get to see what you’ve been working on?”

“Yup. And this is going to be a looong day.”

He laughs. “I’ll be ready and waiting.”

I hold back a groan. I am so not ready for this.

We pull up to the school, and when we walk inside, I feel like my skin is on fire. Do these kids know how much of an effect they have on people? On each other? Do they know they have the power to destroy me today?

I shake the feelings and head to my locker. Today, I refuse to hide.

I finally take Mr. Harkins up on his offer of an escape inside the school. All my projects are done now, so I sit down at a table and just sketch a random face. It’s not very good, but it gets my mind off of what I’m doing today.

Because of Jackson, I’m going to wait until lunch to unveil my project, because I have one last thing to do during art class. I get permission to leave science a few minutes early, and I run into Mr. Harkins’s room to drop off Jackson’s gift and a note at his desk, and then book it down the hall to the theater room.

I hide out there for the rest of art period, where all I can imagine is Jackson as he sees my gift and reads my note.

Jackson,

I don’t think you’ll ever realize how much I needed you this year. You were the only light in the darkest time of my life. I have no idea how to thank you for that or how to make up for the horrible things I’ve let into your life. But I knew I had to tell you, somehow, how much you changed me.

You, Jackson Griffin, helped me break my chains, so I gave you some to remind you of how amazing you are and how much power you have to help people.

You believed in me. Now I believe in you.

Love

Anna

Next to the note, I left a tiny little bottle topped with a cork and filled with a silver chain connected to a key chain hook. The key chain is brittle, cheap. But it’s supposed to be. I want him to always be able to touch it and feel how weak the chains we wear can be. All it takes is the courage to break them.

I end up lying back on the stage and staring up at the lights like I did that first day with Jackson. I was so different back then. So jaded. So lost.

Maybe I’m still lost, still pushing my way through a life I have no idea how to live, but I have my feet planted, and I’m moving toward something. One day, I’ll figure out what that is.

After one more excruciatingly long class, it’s finally lunch and time for me to sink or swim.

I leave my English class early—with the teacher’s permission—to hang my poster (teachers seem happy to let me break rules if it’s for another teacher). I want my poster ready before anyone arrives at lunch. Alex and Jen help me place it right next to the entrance of the cafeteria, where everyone will see it.

Mr. Harkins comes down to check it out himself before all the kids comes crashing down the hall. I’m very glad he did this, because I’m not positive it won’t be destroyed within a few minutes.