What? I thought. That couldn’t be true. Aaron had been right there in the clearing, and he’d seen me lie down. Now that I thought about it, though, it had been midday then; it was late afternoon now. If Nate was telling the truth, how long had I been there, alone and passed out? Are you surprised? I heard Peyton say again in my head, and a shiver ran over me. I wrapped my arms around myself, looking out the window. The buildings were blurring past, but I tried to find just one I could recognize, as if I could somehow locate myself that way.

“Look,” Nate said, “what happened today is over. It doesn’t matter, okay? We’ll get you home, and everything will be fine.”

Hearing this, I felt my eyes well up unexpectedly with hot tears. It was bad to be embarrassed, hard to be ashamed. But pitied? That was the worst of all. Of course Nate would think this could all be so easily resolved. It was how things happened in his world, where he was a friendly guy and worried so you didn’t have to as he went about living his life of helpful errands and good deeds. Unlike me, so dirty and used up and broken. I had a flash of Marshall looking over his shoulder at me, and my head pounded harder.

“Hey,” Nate said now, as if he could hear me thinking this, slipping further and further down this slope. “It’s okay.”

“It’s not,” I said, keeping my eyes fixed on the window. “You couldn’t even understand.”

“Try me.”

“No.” I swallowed, pulling my arms tighter around myself. “It’s not your problem.”

“Ruby, come on. We’re friends.”

“Stop saying that,” I said.

“Why? ”

“Because it’s not true,” I said, now turning to face him. “We don’t even know each other. You just live behind me and give me a ride to school. Why do you think that makes us somehow something?”

“Fine,” he said, holding up his hands. “We’re not friends.”

And now I was a bitch. We rode in silence for a block, Roscoe panting between us. “Look,” I said, “I appreciate what you did. What you’ve done. But the thing is . . . my life isn’t like yours, okay? I’m messed up.”

“Everybody’s messed up,” he said quietly.

“Not like me,” I told him. I thought of Olivia in English class, throwing up her hands: Tell us about your pain. We’re riveted! “Do you even know why I came to live with Cora and Jamie?”

He glanced over at me. “No,” he said.

“Because my mom abandoned me.” My voice felt tight, but I took a breath and kept going. “A couple of months ago, she packed up and took off while I was at school. I was living alone for weeks until my landlords busted me and turned me in to social services. Who then called Cora, who I hadn’t seen in ten years, since she took off for school and never contacted me again.”

“I’m sorry.” This response was automatic, so easy.

“That’s not why I’m telling you.” I sighed, shaking my head. “Do you remember that house I brought you to that day? It wasn’t a friend’s. It was—”

“Yours,” he finished for me. “I know.”

I looked over at him, surprised. “You knew?”

“You had the key around your neck,” he said quietly, glancing at it. “It was kind of obvious.”

I blinked, feeling ashamed all over again. Here at least I thought I’d managed to hide something from Nate that day, kept a part of me a secret, at least until I was ready to reveal it. But I’d been wide open, exposed, all along.

We were coming up on Wildflower Ridge now, and as Nate began to slow down, Roscoe jumped onto my seat, clambering across me to press his muzzle against the window. Without thinking, I reached up to deposit him back where he’d come from, but as soon as I touched him he sank backward, settling into my lap as if this was the most natural thing in the world. For one of us, anyway.

When Nate pulled up in front of Cora’s, I could see the kitchen lights were on, and both her and Jamie’s cars were in the driveway, even though it was early for either of them to be home, much less both. Not a good sign. I reached up, smoothing my hair out of my face, and tried to ready myself before pushing open the door.

“You can tell them he got his shots and the vet said everything’s fine,” Nate said, reaching into the backseat for Roscoe’s leash. Seeing it, the dog leaped up again, moving closer, and he clipped it on his collar. “And if they want to pursue behavioral training for the anxiety thing, she has a couple of names she can give them.”

“Right,” I said. He handed the leash to me, and I took it, picking up my bag with the other hand as I slowly slid out of the car. Roscoe, of course, followed with total eagerness, stretching the leash taut as he pulled me to the house. “Thanks.”

Nate nodded, not saying anything, and I shut the door. Just as I started up the walk, though, I heard the whirring of a window lowering. When I turned around, he said, “Hey, and for what it’s worth? Friends don’t leave you alone in the woods. Friends are the ones who come and take you out.”

I just looked at him. At my feet, Roscoe was straining at his leash, wanting to go home.

“At least,” Nate said, “that’s been my experience. I’ll see you, okay?”

I nodded, and then his window slid back up, and he was pulling away.

As I watched him go, Roscoe was still tugging, trying to pull me closer to the house. My instinct was to do the total opposite, even though by now I’d left, and been left, enough times to know that neither of them was good, or easy, or even preferable. Still, it wasn’t until we started up the walk to those waiting bright lights that I realized this— coming back—was the hardest of all.