Me: U n me both. She is 2 stubborn

Once Mom sets her mind to something, there’s pretty much no stopping her. Even if it means splitting up her family and moving to the middle of nowhere.

Tash: Hows the house?

A million descriptions flash through my mind. Too big. Too empty. Too…suburban.

Me: Boring, so cookie cutter

Tash: *vomit-gags*

I never thought I would miss our brownstone on the Upper West Side. All my life I’ve wanted to live anywhere but—the Lower East Side, Williamsburg, Park Slope. Somewhere with more edge. More soul. More artistic heart.

But compared to suburban Austin, the Upper West Side is a freaking hippie commune.

At least the brownstone had personality. I miss the cool roughness of the exposed brick on the ground floor, the weird-shaped micro closet in my bedroom, and the ultra-creepy basement. The third step that sounds like a moaning ghost when you step on it just right. The way the upstairs windows rattle in the wind. Every corner had something unique to explore.

This place, with its uniformly plastered and painted walls, slab foundation, and spacious walk-in closet is too…normal.

At least it’s only a rental.

Tash: When duz school start

Me: 2moro

Tash: :( :( :(

Me: Ur telling me

Tash: SODA wont be same w/o u! Who will I sneak out w/ at lunch?

I almost reply, With Brice, but that wound is still too raw. Someday we’ll laugh about it. Not today. Not when Tash will be walking through the doors of the School of Drama and Art next week, the same as we’ve done for the last three years, only this time without me at her side.

Me: U’ll find some1

Tash never has a problem finding friends. Which is probably the only reason we’re besties. For the most part, I’d rather be on my own. Other people tend to get complicated. See: Tash and Brice, relationship of.

I sigh. No use going down that path for the millionth time. I guess if I’m looking for a bright side to being 1,750 miles away (I looked it up—just in case I decide to walk home) it’s that I won’t have to see my best friend and my almost boyfriend play lovebirds before my eyes.

Me: Better go. Skule starts early

Tash: Miss u! xxxooo

Me: Miss u

As I slide my phone back into my pocket, my vision blurs. But I know it’s not a panic attack this time. It’s the realization that life is going on without me back in New York.

Not that I expected Tash’s world to stop spinning. Nothing ever seems to derail her for long. I always knew that her days would go on like normal. I just didn’t expect the thought to hurt this much.

“Get a grip, Whitaker,” I tell myself.

It’s not like self-pity is going to change anything.

No, the only thing that’s going to fix my world is getting home to New York. The sooner the better. I just don’t know how to convince Mom of that.

“Do all New Yorkers talk to themselves?” a teasing male voice calls out from the dark below.

I sit up a little straighter, peering into our yard and the light spilling from the kitchen.

There’s no one there.

I sense movement from the corner of my eye and turn in time to see a boy climb onto the fence between our house and the neighbors’. I can barely make out his features in the glow from the window behind me. Tall, with tan skin and dark hair that falls to his shoulders in an artfully shaggy mess.

This must be the infamous Tru Dorsey.

Great. It’s his mom’s fault that I’m here right now.

Mom didn’t choose Austin out of thin air. She’s a native, born and bred until she went away to New York to attend Columbia Law.

Gramma and Gramps retired to Florida a few years ago, but she still has a lot of friends here, and Uncle Mason isn’t too far away in Dallas.

Mrs. Dorsey is Mom’s college BFF, and she and Mr. Dorsey own this house and like three others in the neighborhood. When she told Mom that the house next to theirs was available, Mom jumped on the chance to get me out of the city and away from my “bad influences”—her words, not mine.

When we arrived, we found the keys in an envelope under the doormat and a letter letting us know that the Dorseys were away on a last-fling-of-summer vacation.

Apparently they’re back.

“Does every Austin-dweller invade their neighbor’s privacy?” I return.

His face is a map of shadows and light, but I can clearly see the Asian influence of his mom’s genetics. High cheekbones, thick slashing brows, a square jaw. The light catches a flash of white teeth from his smile.

“Actually,” he says, not looking down as he walks without wobbling across the top of the fence toward me, “the proper term is Austinites.”

I turn back to my tablet. “I can think of some other terms.”

“I’m wounded,” he says. “You don’t even know me.”

I feel like I do. I’ve heard Mom talk a lot about Tru over the years, how he’s such a disappointment and always in trouble. How Mrs. Dorsey is just heartbroken and doesn’t know how to get through to him, to get him to take his future seriously.

After The Incident, Mom made plenty of comparisons between him and yours truly.

She also gave me an explicit warning to stay away from him.

Not that I need to be warned away from guys like Tru. All false smiles and pretty words, handsome enough to melt the hardest heart, and he knows it. Certain he can flatter or flirt his way out of anything. He and Brice have that in common. I got burned once, and now I carry a fire extinguisher with me at all times.

I focus on my sketching.

There is a scraping sound and then a grunt of effort. When I look toward the fence, he’s gone.

For a second I wonder if he fell—and I probably would feel bad about it if he did—but then I see him hefting himself up over the end of the roof.

“What are you doing?” I hiss.

Tru pushes to his feet and walks confidently toward me. “Coming to meet the new neighbors.”

“We have a front door.”

“Front doors are so pedestrian,” he says as he plops down next to me.

“Exactly,” I say. “Meaning you’re supposed to walk to them.”

“But this makes our meet-cute so much more memorable.”

“This is not a—”

“Sloane?” Mom’s voice calls from the yard below. “Is that you? I heard footsteps on the roof.”

Her hair appears past the edge of the roof, and I know she’s walking out on the porch so she can turn around and look up. If she does, she’ll see me sitting with Tru Dorsey, and my prison sentence will be upgraded to maximum security. I don’t want to lose what little freedom I have left.

Without stopping to think, I reach over and push Tru down.

When he starts to say something, I slap my hand over his mouth.

“Just getting some air,” I call down as Mom’s face appears in the glow from the porch light.

She frowns. “Is that safe?”

“It’s fine,” I reply.

Considering how much I don’t want to be here, she should be more concerned about the possibility of me jumping off the roof than falling. Tru chooses that moment to lick my palm.

“Eeeep!” I can’t help but squeal as I yank my hand away.

“Sloane?!” Mom gasps.

“I’m fine,” I grind out, throwing a quick glare at Tru, who is grinning like an idiot. I want to wipe my hand on my jeans—because gross—but I don’t want to give him the satisfaction. “Just saw a spider.”

“Have you unpacked yet?” she asks.

I picture my room full of boxes, the packing tape still intact. They are all neatly labeled—thanks to Mom—but inside they’re disasters—thanks to me. I just can’t bring myself to open them. It’ll be like I’ve given up, given in. Like I’m admitting that we’re actually in Texas, which I’m not.

“Some,” I lie.

“Sloane…” Her voice takes on that warning tone.