DeMarcus climbed to the top of his podium. He was about to start practice. I needed to be in the drum section when that happened, ready to play my riff. “Sawyer,” I said, “I have to go.”

He didn’t budge.

“Sawyer,” I complained, “not funny. You’re going to get me in trouble. You know I’m stressed out, so I actually care about that shit today.”

He was incredibly heavy in my lap.

“Now you’re worrying me,” I said. “You’re making me think you’ve passed out in there. Come on, Sawyer. Joke’s over.”

DeMarcus made his move and Will played the riff, which the rest of the drum line repeated. The boom of drums echoed around the stadium, followed by silence, just as I pulled Sawyer’s pelican head off.

Sawyer’s soaked blond head and broad shoulders lay limp across me. He really had passed out.

“Will!” I shrieked.

DeMarcus turned around on his podium. The cheerleaders off to the side of the band rushed over. “No, no, no,” I yelled as they gathered around, “Don’t crowd us. I need Will.”

And then he was there, towering over the girls. “Back up,” he told them. They all stared at him with wide, heavily made-up eyes and took two steps back. He shouted to DeMarcus, “Call 911.” He told me, “Hold him,” and when I put my arms around Sawyer, Will pulled off the rest of his costume. Sawyer wore only a pair of gym shorts. His muscular body flopped like a rag doll. That’s when I really got scared.

Will knelt down under Sawyer, then stood so Sawyer’s whole body draped over one shoulder. “Come on,” he told me. “Get them out of my way.”

I jumped up. “Move,” I barked to the cheerleaders and majorettes gawking at us. They parted, clearing a path to the gate. I stepped aside to let Will pass, then closed the gate behind me, glaring at the girls and daring them to cross me. I turned and jogged up the stairs behind Will, who was making great time up the incline despite carrying a hundred and fifty pounds.

At the top of the stairs, he grunted, “Help me.” I reached up to ease Sawyer onto the ground, in the shade underneath the bleachers. Will nodded toward a hose coiled next to the concession stand. “Turn that on.”

I dragged the hose over and let the water gush over Sawyer’s legs, then his torso—soaking his gym shorts, which I would have made a joke about any other time—then his arms and his neck, keeping the flow away from his face so I didn’t drown him.

“No, get his head.” Will turned Sawyer on his side.

I wet Sawyer’s hair, then looked to Will for guidance.

“Keep doing it,” Will said. “We just need to cool him down.” He pressed his thumb over Sawyer’s wrist to feel his pulse.

“How do you know this?” I asked, moving the hose down to Sawyer’s chest again.

“I googled ‘heatstroke’ because I’ve spent the last two weeks thinking I was going to have one.” Will glanced up. “You must have known, or you wouldn’t have called to me for help.”

“I called to you for help because you’re you. I knew you would keep your shit together in a crisis.”

I sighed with relief as sirens approached. And then Sawyer blinked his eyes open and tried to sit up. “Stay cool, man,” Will said softly, pressing one hand on Sawyer’s chest. He told me, “One of us should go with him to the hospital.”

I wanted desperately to go. More than that, I wanted what was best for Sawyer. “You go, because you’ll be more helpful.”

“I’ll go,” Will agreed, “because you have to work after school.” He looked up at me. “Kaye and Harper told me you took off work and cleaned your house yesterday. Are you okay?”

I nodded.

Sawyer tried to sit up again, struggling against Will’s hand. “What the fuck,” he said weakly. “Get the f**k off me.”

Will glanced at me. “He’ll be okay.”

All at once, the parking lot was bursting with sirens, louder and louder until Will and I put our hands over our ears. An ambulance arrived, plus an overkill pumper truck from the fire department, a couple of police cars that had come to see what all the excitement was about, and Ms. Nakamoto, followed by the principal, who was really booking it across the asphalt. I’d never seen an old lady run that fast, especially in heels. I was impressed.

With all those folks crowding around, there wasn’t anything left for me to do but turn off and coil up the hose and watch the paramedics argue with Sawyer, who insisted he was fine, and promptly threw up. I shared one last look with Will before the paramedics closed him and Sawyer inside the ambulance. As it retreated across the parking lot, I heaved a long sigh and realized for the first time how tense my shoulders had been.

I wandered back down the stairs to the stadium. The band was running through the halftime show. While I watched, four people tripped over Will’s drum, which nobody had the foresight to remove from the middle of the field where he’d dropped it. Before I retrieved my own drum from the bench, I took Kaye aside from the rest of the cheerleaders.

“When class is over,” I whispered, “could you hang out around the boys’ locker room and ask someone to get Sawyer’s stuff for you? I have to work.”

Kaye frowned. “You want me to take it to him? His homework can wait until tomorrow.”

“No, he needs his wallet with his insurance card,” I insisted. “He needs his phone to call people because he won’t remember anybody’s number off the top of his head, and he needs his keys to get inside his house in case he’s actually released from the hospital today.”

“What about his dad?”

“His dad is up in Panama City, selling blown-glass figurines on the pier. They have a bigger Labor Day crowd than we do.”

The resistance on her face melted into sympathy. “What about his brother?”

“You can’t count on his brother for anything.”

I snagged my drum and made my way through the band to my place. As the rest of the period crawled by, I decided it was too bad I couldn’t take the SAT on demand. Right this second I would have made a perfect score.

***

Violet was in a job interview with Bob and Roger in the back office, and I was manning the front counter, when the antique cowbell rang. Will came through the door, his big body blocking so much sun that he made the room turn dark.

“How’s Sawyer?” I asked. I hoped he hadn’t come by to give me bad news personally.

“He’s fine,” Will said. “He’s dehydrated. He’s getting an IV.” He touched the back of his hand with two fingers, which I assumed was where the IV went. “A bunch of people from school are there with him now. He wants you to come by after work.”

I nodded.

Will looked uncomfortably around the shop, as if he didn’t want to meet my gaze, then pointed at the floor. “I’m going to borrow this dog.”

“Okay,” I said, like that was not weird.

“Come on,” he said. Even though his voice hadn’t changed and the dog wasn’t looking at him, she jumped up when he spoke to her. They disappeared out the door.

I stared through the window and into the street, which looked like it always did, as though the boy I loved most in the world hadn’t just bopped in to steal the shop dog. If it wasn’t for the antique bell still swinging on its ribbon and chiming gently, I would have suspected it hadn’t happened at all.

I slid down from my stool, emerged from behind the counter, and leaned out the door, peering down the street. Far away, past all the shops, in the tree-shaded park next to the marina, the dog was chasing Will. Will stopped suddenly and reached for the dog, who bent her body just out of his reach and scampered away. Now Will chased the dog. The dog spun to face him. They both crouched in the stance of a dog at the ready, each daring the other to jump first. Will made a grab and the dog dashed away.

I knew Will was still missing a lot of what he’d had back home. But at least he’d taken this first step toward finding what he needed here in town. I watched him and the dog for a while, playing together in the long shadows of the trees.

***

By the time I made it to the hospital that night, everybody else had cleared out. Sawyer was alone in a room for two patients. The other guy must have died. Sawyer was curled into the fetal position with an IV tube snaking to his hand. He faced away from the door, and his hospital gown fell open to reveal his butt crack, because Sawyer did not care.

“Nice ass,” I said from the doorway.

“Thanks,” he said without moving.

I walked to the other side of the bed. “Are you hungry at all? I thought you might be, since you lost your lunch. I brought you something.” I peeled the aluminum foil off the plate of amarillos, beans, and an empanada. “Violet made it vegan for you.”

He sat up, took the plate and fork I handed him, and shoveled in a mouthful. He swallowed and rolled his eyes. “Oh. My. God. They don’t do vegan at this hospital. I was starving. This is so good.” After a few more bites, he held the plate out to me, offering me some.

“I ate already,” I said.

“Good, because I didn’t really want to give you any.” He ate another mouthful. “Violet should be cooking at the Crab Lab.”

“Nah. She’d rather explain to two old men where their antiques are.”

He swallowed. “It’s been forever since I had Puerto Rican food. I forget y’all are half Puerto Rican.”

“Me too,” I said. “Can I get you a drink?”

“Yeah, a Sprite. My eleventh Sprite. Down the hall in the fridge.”

Wandering back in with the can, I asked him, “When are they letting you out?”

“They would have let me out already, but someone is supposed to watch me. They need somebody to release me to. My dad isn’t coming home, and my brother won’t get off work until after visiting hours are over. He said he’ll come buy me out tomorrow morning.”

I flopped down in the chair beside the bed. “Will they release you to me?”

“No. I took the liberty of asking, but when I said your name, the nurse looked all outraged and hollered, ‘That girl who—’ Well, never mind what she said.”

I knew which nurse he was talking about. I’d seen DeMarcus’s mom on my way in. DeMarcus had thrown a big Halloween party in seventh grade, and his mom had walked in on me teaching him to French kiss. I guess I didn’t have a reputation for being nursing material.

“I can get somebody down here to spring you,” I said. “Harper’s mom, or—you know who would be perfect? Kaye’s mom.” She was the president of a bank and looked it. Nobody messed with her.

“I don’t want to do that to anybody who isn’t you,” Sawyer said.

“Aw. Hugs.” I stood up and wrapped my arms around him, careful to keep my dress out of the amarillos.

“I’m swearing it all off,” he said into my hair. “Alcohol and weed. All mind-altering substances.”

I sat back down, shocked. “You are?”

“Yes.”

“Working in a bar?”

“Yes.”

“Well, you’re a vegan working in a restaurant that serves primarily seafood and meat,” I said. “If anybody could swear off alcohol working in a bar, it would be you. And I think that would be great. It’s not good for you, or me either. But if you’re doing it because you had heatstroke . . . I do think being dehydrated the day after drinking didn’t help you, but you had heatstroke because you were dressed up in a pelican costume at two p.m. on the hottest day of the year in Florida.”

“I know.”

“Does it have something to do with your mystery girl?”

“I’m never getting Kaye,” he said. “And I wouldn’t change my life for her. I’ve learned that from you. I’m not changing for somebody else, because that person could disappear. The only person to change for is yourself.”

I was astounded. I’d thought I had him figured out. It never occurred to me that he had me figured out in return. And when he took my thoughts and put them in his own words, I sounded halfway noble.

“But like you said,” he went on, “alcohol was a contributing factor to my mortifying collapse. I shouldn’t be giving in to contributing factors when I already have an as**ole brother and a jailbird dad. You know, for the first time in my life, I feel like I’m really good at something. I was a mediocre athlete. I’m an indifferent student. But I’m an excellent pelican. I support the school and I make people laugh.”

“You do. You’re a great symbol for the school.”

“Being an excellent pelican is pretty sad, as career skills go. It isn’t everything. But it’s not nothing.” He set his clean plate on the bedside table. “What I feel worst about is Minnesota coming around the corner after I’d handed you that joint. I mean, nice guy. I heard he hauled me up the stairs at the stadium.”

“He did,” I said.

“And he stayed with me here until Harper and Kaye and DeMarcus and everybody showed up. He was as nice as he could be after all the shit I’ve given him during the past couple of weeks. I ruined everything between you two.”

“You didn’t,” I said sadly. “I did that all by myself.”

“Obviously not, or he wouldn’t have come looking for you last night.”

I stayed with Sawyer, even doing my English homework there while he made fun of me and called me a sellout. When visiting hours were over, DeMarcus’s mom kicked me out of the room. But all the while, in the back of my mind, I was formulating a plan for how I could put my stress-induced organizational skills to good use.