The Thrashers(41)

Cheryl Montgomery rounded them up at 6:45 and set them up. She snapped a few other poses, asking Paige to “please smile with your teeth, honey.”

Paige grabbed her phone back from her mom to check the pictures, and Jodi saw her face fall.

“What’s wrong?” Cheryl said. “Did I have my thumb over the flash again?”

Paige was pale beneath her contouring when she said, “No, it’s perfect.” She smiled at her mom and turned to show Jodi, smile gone.

There, just above Lucy’s head on the stairs, a white flare. Like a splotch, or a reflection. Like a fourth person on the totem pole.

Jodi snapped her eyes up to Paige. “It’s fine. It’s—it’s just your phone. I’ll edit it out. Send it to me.”

Cheryl announced that Zack had pulled up as Lucy grabbed Paige’s phone and looked.

“Paige, you gotta stop it with this,” she whispered firmly.

Nodding, Paige brushed her lashes and fanned her face, taking a deep breath to bury it. “It just really freaks me out.”

“It’s just your phone—”

“It’s a new phone,” Paige hissed. “I took my phone back last week and traded it out.”

Lucy blinked at her, searching for words.

The front door opened. “Eyyyy, did someone order a homecoming date?” Zack danced inside, moving to Cheryl to hug her tightly.

Paige smiled a bit too brightly and seemed to push it all to the side. The five of them took pictures that would never see Instagram, accepted wine coolers from Paige’s mom (except Jodi and Zack, who had promised to drive), and agreed to call for a ride back if they needed it. Before they left the house, Zack stopped them all in the entryway. He jumped up on the bottom stair and cleared his throat theatrically.

“I know this homecoming is a little different from what we wanted. But I thought it would be nice to acknowledge the true queen of New Helvetia High.” He smirked and pointed at Paige. “Julian grabbed this yesterday and had the idea to do our own coronation.”

Zack reached into his blazer inside pocket and pulled out a Burger King crown that they give to kids. Paige snorted, cackling as she let Zack crown her. Cheryl took pictures like it was the real ceremony as Lucy and Jodi laughed.

Jodi looked over to Julian and saw him smiling at Paige in her stupid cardboard crown. He was in a blue button-down and charcoal slacks—no tie, no jacket. Only Julian Hollister could make dressed-down look dressed-up. The shirt was probably tailored for him, if the way it hugged his ribs and waist was any indication. Her gaze drifted back to his face just in time for him to glance her way. Jodi pulled her eyes away quickly.

They finally crammed into Zack’s Mustang at ten after seven and drove to the back entrance of the school parking lot. Jodi hovered at Paige’s elbow once in the gym, saying hi to the people who talked to Paige, but not really seeing any point in mingling with people she didn’t know. She saw Oliver, Nikita, and a few others dancing, flailing limbs and screaming lyrics. Oliver waved when he saw her, and Jodi felt her chest swell when she sent him a shy wave back.

Paige started dancing with some friends from cheer squad, and Jodi excused herself, despite Paige begging her to dance. Her Converse wedges were pinching her, though it was nice to be closer to Paige and Lucy’s height with the extra three inches. She slipped out the side door, winding quickly through the locker room, where she could hear people hooking up, and out the exterior door to the field.

No one was around, despite the security guards that usually patrolled. She made her way toward the bleachers, trekking through the crisscross beams until reaching their usual spot under the rows behind the accessible seating. She was the first one there, or so she thought.

“Did Spencer Gordon not ask you to dance this time?” a voice called from above.

She looked up through the bleachers and saw black Chucks sitting above her, the smell of pot curling through the air. Making her way out from under the rows, she entered the field and found Julian sitting on the fifth bench up, staring out at the field.

“Spencer Gordon? He hasn’t talked to me all semester.” Spencer had asked her to dance at prom last year. It was nice to not be alone during a slow song, but she couldn’t help but be suspicious that Paige had set it up somehow. She didn’t think about it much after that, because it had been the night Emily died.

Jodi climbed up and sat on the fourth row, straddling the bench in a way that would make Aunt Rosa cluck her tongue.

“That’s because you hide at lunch.” He took a drag and puffed it out. She rolled her eyes and stared out at the parking lot. “He talks about you. It’s annoying.”

Snapping her eyes up to him, Jodi stared. “He talks about me? What does that mean?”

He sucked in a breath of clean air and said in a dull, mocking voice, “‘I guess Jodi didn’t take calculus this year, huh?’ ‘Was Jodi hurt at the drive-in?’ ‘So, you guys all going stag to homecoming? Is Jodi going stag?’”

She narrowed her eyes at him. “You’re exaggerating. Spencer hasn’t talked to me since prom.” Waving away his smoky exhale, she bit her lip. Spencer was really cute, and they had a lot of the same favorite TV shows. She shook her head clear and said, “He has my number. If he liked me, he could have texted or something.”

“Sometimes it doesn’t work that way.” Julian stretched out his chest, pulling his arms back with a pop. “Look at you. You’ve had Zack’s number for ten years.”