dry. Standing in front of the classroom was Ezra from the bar. Ezra, the recipient of her haiku. Her Ezra, looking lanky and adorable in aRosewood jacket and tie, his hair combed, his buttons buttoned correctly, and a leather-bound lesson planner under his left arm. Standing at the blackboard and writing⦠Mr. Fitz, AP English.
He stared at her, his face draining of color. âHoly shit.â
The entire class turned around to see who he was looking at. Aria didnât want to stare back at them, so she looked down at her text message.
Aria: Surprise! I wonder what your pig puppet will have to say about this⦠âA
Holy shit, indeed.
6
EMILYâS FRENCH TOO!
Tuesday afternoon, Emily stood in front of her green metal locker after the final bell of the day had rung. The locker still had her old stickers from last yearâUSA Swimming, Liv Tyler as Arwen the elf, and a magnet that said, COED NAKED BUTTERFLY . Her boyfriend, Ben, hovered next to her.
âYou want to hit Wawa?â he asked. His Rosewood swimming jacket hung loosely off his lanky, muscular body, and his blond hair was a little messy.
âNah, Iâm good,â Emily answered. Because they had practice at three-thirty after school, the swimmers usually just stayed at Rosewood and sent someone off to Wawa so they could get their hoagie/iced tea/Cheats/Reeseâs Pieces fix before swimming a billion laps.
A bunch of boys stopped to slap Benâs hand as they headed toward the parking lot. Spencer Hastings, who was in Benâs history class last year, waved. Emily wavedback before realizing Spencer was looking at Ben, not her. It was hard to believe that after everything theyâd been through together and all the secrets they shared, they now acted like strangers.
After everyone passed, Ben turned back to her and frowned. âYouâve got your jacket on. Youâre not practicing?â
âUm.â Emily shut her locker and gave the combination a spin. âYou know that girl Iâve been showing around today? Iâm walking her to her house âcause this is her first day and all.â
He smirked. âWell, arenât you sweet? Parents of prospective students pay for tours, but youâre doing it for free.â
âCome on.â Emily smiled uneasily. âItâs like a ten-minute walk.â
Ben looked at her, vaguely nodding for a little while.
âWhat? Iâm just trying to be nice!â
âThatâs cool,â he said, and smiled. He took his eyes off her to wave at Casey Kirschner, the captain of the boysâ varsity wrestling team.
Maya appeared a minute after Ben loped down the side stairs out to the student parking lot. She wore a white denim jacket over her Rosewood oxford shirt and Oakley flip-flops on her feet. Her toenails werenât painted. âHey,â she said.
âHey.â Emily tried to sound bright, but she felt uneasy. Maybe she shouldâve just gone to practice with Ben. Was it weird to walk Maya home and walk right back?
âReady?â Maya asked.
The girls walked through campus, which was basically a bunch of very old brick buildings off a twisty back road in Rosewood. There was even a Gothic clock tower that chimed out the hours. Earlier, Emily had shown Maya all the standard stuff that every private school has. Sheâd also shown her the cool things about Rosewood Day that you usually had to discover on your own, like the dangerous toilet in the girlsâ first-floor bathroom that sometimes spewed up geyser-style, the secret spot on the hill kids went when they cut gym class (not that Emily ever would), and the schoolâs only vending machine that sold Vanilla Coke, her favorite. Theyâd even developed an inside joke about the prim, stick-up-her-butt model on the anti-smoking posters that hung outside the nurseâs office. It felt good to have an inside joke again.
Now, as they cut through an unused cornfield to
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