RYDER: But even if I stopped, I don’t know how simple it would be to make friends. Hamilton’s a small school. You all have known each other forever. I’m an outsider here.

ME: Maybe, but it wouldn’t be too difficult for you. If you’d be cool, people at Hamilton would love you. Especially the girls. You’re fresh meat, a boy we’ve never seen throw up on the school bus or go through the worst parts of puberty. Plus, you’re not a bad-looking guy, you know.

I could not believe I’d just typed that. Mortified doesn’t even begin to cover it. It was true, of course. He was hot, and if he wasn’t such a dick about our hometown, girls probably would have thrown themselves at him. No, not probably. Most definitely.

But I didn’t have to tell him that.

Ryder sent back a smiley face emoji. I sent back one rolling its eyes. And eventually this devolved into an oh-so-sophisticated emoji war. The battle was long and there were many casualties, but eventually, with the peace offering of emoji sushi, a cease-fire was called.

If only it were so easy in real life.

The next day, though, Ryder was back to being unbearable.

“Mr. Buckley,” he said, raising his hand. “When are we going to start practicing DBQs?”

“Excuse me?”

“DBQs,” Ryder repeated. “It stands for data-based questions. They’ll be on the AP test in the spring.”

“I’m aware what a DBQ is, Mr. Cross. I am the teacher here, after all.”

I expected Ryder to make a snide comment about this, but he managed to restrain himself and instead asked, “So when will we start practicing them?”

“After Thanksgiving.”

“Don’t you think that’s awfully late?”

“Oh dear,” I said. I was less able to restrain myself. “That’s far too late. Did you know that in DC, students start preparing for AP tests just out of utero?”

Ryder turned to face me, mid-eye-roll. “While your hyperbole is ridiculous, we do start preparing way in advance. And our AP test results reflect it.”

“If only you’d spent as much time working on your social skills.”

“You are going to lecture me on social skills?”

“I’m sorry. Do us ignorant country folk here in Hamilton not communicate to your liking?”

“It’s not a problem with everyone in Hamilton.”

“Enough,” Mr. Buckley said. I was actually amazed at how long he’d let this go on. I suspected he got as much entertainment out of the sparring as the rest of the class did.

And … I think I kind of enjoyed it, too.

Honestly, though, it was amazing how funny and pleasant Ryder could be over IM, only to turn around and be a pompous jerk in real life. I was getting some serious whiplash.

Which was why I couldn’t respond to his IMs anymore. No más. I was done. It was already weird enough since, both times, I’d been on Amy’s account. She didn’t know about the second conversation, and I’d had to lie when she asked me if I knew why Ryder had given her a mixtape (seriously? Who has tapes anymore?) of some weird, poorly recorded band and asked if she’d sit with him at lunch.

“No idea,” I’d said. “I mean, we know he likes you…. What did you say?”

“Thank you, but that I always sit with you,” she’d replied.

Well, that was easy enough. Ryder would never sit at a lunch table with me. So I just shrugged.

Lying was easy. What was worse was that these conversations had totally confused my once unwavering disdain for Ryder Cross.

It had been easier when I hated him.

I would. Not. Respond.

Once again, insomnia had me sitting in the Rushes’ rec room well after midnight, only this time I didn’t have any homework left to do. Instead, I was torturing myself by looking up how far all of the colleges Amy was applying to were from Hamilton.

Answer: Really freaking far.

What the hell was I going to do? I hadn’t heard back from any of the jobs I’d applied for, I had no money, and when Amy left for college, I’d essentially be homeless. It wasn’t as if I could keep sneaking into her parents’ house.

Needless to say, I was already feeling a bit depressed and a little lonely when I heard the ping.

“Not falling for it this time, Ryder,” I mumbled.

Ping.

Nope.

Ping.

“Damn it.”

I told myself I was just going to log out of Amy’s e-mail. I told myself I wasn’t going to look at the message. But, as we’ve established, I am a liar, even when I’m talking to myself.

RYDER: Hey, Amy, are you there?

RYDER: I’m sorry. It’s late, and you’re probably not even near your computer. But I just found something out and I need to talk to someone. You were the only person I could think of.

RYDER: Sorry. Never mind.

As much as I wanted to ignore him, I couldn’t. There was something sort of desperate in those messages that I couldn’t just walk away from.

To my surprise, I was … concerned. About Ryder Cross.

ME: Hey, I’m here. What’s going on? Are you okay?

RYDER: Not really.

RYDER: Do you have a few minutes?

I should’ve said no. I should’ve logged off.

But my own loneliness — mixed with my concern and curiosity — got the better of me.

ME: I’ve got all night.

I closed out the other Internet tabs, almost glad for the distraction. I couldn’t keep thinking about Amy leaving me for college. I wanted to go back to covering my ears and pretending it wasn’t happening. And if my only distraction was Ryder, so be it.

RYDER: My friend Aaron called me tonight. I knew something was up when I saw his name on my phone. He hasn’t called me in over a month.

ME: This is the one who’s dating your ex-girlfriend, right? The girl with the terrible name?

RYDER: Right, but it wasn’t about that.

RYDER: He was calling because he saw my dad, and he wanted to warn me.

ME: Warn you about what?

RYDER: He saw my dad leaving our house (Aaron lives next door) with this woman.

RYDER: This model.

He sent a link to a Google Images page, and I clicked it. My screen filled with dozens of shots of a beautiful brunette — Annalise Stone. She was a runway model from New York and only a few years older than Ryder and me.

ME: Wow. She’s pretty.

ME: Wait. Do you think he’s seeing her?

RYDER: Why else would she be leaving our house?

I wanted to make some sort of joke in response to this question, but I got the sense that this wasn’t the appropriate time.

ME: I don’t understand. I thought he didn’t want to divorce your mom.

RYDER: That’s what I thought, too. So I asked her.

RYDER: She didn’t want to tell me, but apparently that’s why she left. Because he’s been seeing this woman for a while.

ME: He’s been cheating?

RYDER: Yeah.

RYDER: But he refuses to give Mom a divorce because he thinks it’ll hurt his chances in the election in a couple of weeks.

ME: Well, so will sneaking around with a model half his age.

RYDER: I’m guessing he’s trying to keep that secret. But if Aaron could find out, the other candidates could, too.

ME: I’m sorry, Ryder.

And I was. I knew just how fraught with disappointment parental relationships could be. And how fucking much it could hurt when the people who raised you let you down.

RYDER: I feel like an idiot.

ME: Why???

RYDER: This whole time I’ve been blaming my mom. I’ve thought of her as selfish and cold. In reality, she was trying to keep me from hating Dad. No matter how much he hurt her.

ME: That doesn’t make you an idiot.

RYDER: Maybe not, but worshipping Dad does. I’ve been thinking he was this saint. Even when I couldn’t get him on the phone, I made excuses for him.