Rowan hangs around for a second like she doesn’t want to leave. “You sure you’re good?”

I nod. “Sure. Say hey to Charlie for me and I’ll see you after at the balls. Dot-com.” I pause, realizing what I just said, and then we both make faces. “At the car, I mean.”

“Okay. See ya.” She heads back toward her hallway. I turn to my locker to pull out a few books as the guy whose locker is next to mine says, “Hey, Jules. Welcome back.”

We’ve barely spoken before. This is weird.

“Thanks,” I say, suddenly shy. I take my coat off and go to hang it up, when I hear the voice that makes my thighs quake.

“Catch you later, guys. Hey, Jules.”

Before I can turn around, he’s turning me around, and then his gentle arms are hugging me, lifting my feet off the ground. Holding me. Right here in public. I let my coat fall from my fingers and I wrap my arms—cast and all—around his neck like it’s the most natural thing for me to do in the middle of a crowded high school hallway.

“I missed you so much,” he whispers into my hair, and the world goes quiet around us. My body pulses with energy and I can feel his warmth seeping into me.

I close my eyes and breathe, wishing everybody would just disappear.

He sets me back down and I look at his face for the first time in what seems like forever. He smooths my static hair and keeps a hand on my shoulder. The corner of his mouth turns up on one side, just the way I like it. But his eyes are tired.

“I missed you too,” I say in a quiet voice, suddenly hyperaware of people staring at us, my former friend Roxie and her BFF Sarah among them. Which makes me feel really awkward, so I try to pretend they’re not there.

He observes the cast on my arm and smooths a thumb under the eye that used to be black. “Nice,” he says. He glances over one shoulder, then the other, gets a goofy smile on his face, and moistens his lips. “I really want to kiss you,” he says quietly near my ear. But I think we’re being cautious, or else he spotted a teacher, because instead of kissing me he just runs his thumb across my lips and looks at me so longingly it hurts.

“Dang,” I say, a little breathless. “Where’s a stupid playground when you need one? This, uh, environment feels . . . awkward.”

“I wanna be your playground,” he says in my ear, and I feel the heat rushing to my face. I can see he’s just messing around, flirting, but he stays close, like he can’t stand to have much space between us, and I like him there.

“Rowr.” I grin, but I’m preoccupied, searching his eyes, and the grin falls away. As he watches me watch him, his face changes, like he can read the question in my mind.

“About that,” he says, as if we started the conversation already. “I desperately, desperately need to see you alone.” And even though his eyes are hungry, this is different.

“I know.” I’ve been thinking about this already. “Mr. Polselli is on parking-lot duty during lunch on Mondays. He’ll let me eat in his room. I’ll claim I need your help because of the cast.”

“You’re brilliant,” he says with a breath that trickles down my neck. “I’m sorry I haven’t told you—I’ll explain everything, it’s just—”

I press a finger to his lips and watch his eyelids droop halfway in response. “I get it,” I tell him, and reluctantly pull my finger away when the bell rings.

His gaze lingers and burns. “See you at lunch,” he says. “I’ll bring two trays and meet you there.”

When he disappears in the crowd, I turn back toward my open locker and stare into it, dazed. Holy big sizzle, Demarco. Is it hot in here or is it just my gorgeous boyfriend? At this rate, we’ll have like nine babies by the end of our senior year.

Four

Before lunch I dodge strangers and classmates trying to talk to me, which is absolutely the weirdest experience of my school life, and find Trey to let him know I’m going to have a private lunch with Sawyer, so I’ll see him in art class.

He smirks. “Tell the two-timing lunch whore I said hey.” “I will kiss him for you,” I say, and then I add, “I hope, anyway.” But Trey has moved on with the hallway traffic. I slip into Mr. Polselli’s empty room, sit at a desk, and wait, forcing myself to work on a math assignment. When the door opens I look up and my smile freezes on my face. Not only is it Sawyer with two lunch trays, but Roxie and BFF Sarah are with him, apparently there to open the door.

Sawyer and Roxie are laughing at BFF Sarah, who rants about something, and all I can think about is how I want them gone.

“Oh. Hi, Julia,” Roxie says to me, like she didn’t expect to see me. “Thanks for saving our favorite restaurant.”

I stare at her, wondering if she’s really that rude that she values the restaurant over the human lives—Sawyer’s life—or if she’s just stupid. But new Jules isn’t going to smile and walk away. “Wow. Did you really just say that?” I say. I glance at Sawyer, who looks almost as offended as I feel.

Roxie looks confused. “Yeah, did you not just hear me?”

BFF Sarah’s lack of greeting brings frostiness to the air. She’s probably still peeved about the V-Day decorations I knocked out of her hands.

“Okay, well, thanks for the help,” Sawyer says pointedly to them. He sets a tray on my desk and then sits down at the one next to me. “Can you close the door on the way out?”