But the men on my screen now were from another generation altogether. Any personal connection with them would likely involve Barry Manilow and a deep affection for Tom Brokaw.
I took a sip from my hot chocolate, flipped to the next profile, and nearly choked when I saw the face on the screen. “Oh my god.”
Cory Dempsey. Mr. Dempsey, math teacher at my former high school. His blue eyes were just as vibrant on the screen as I remembered them, with that same unruly brown hair curling around his ears. The girls loved him, and the boys wanted to be him. His profile listed his age as forty-eight, but he’d always seemed younger—more like the students than the other teachers. Engaging and energetic, always voted the most popular teacher by the senior class, including mine.
But great teaching wasn’t why people whispered about him. In the girls’ bathroom, in the corners of the cafeteria, on the bleachers at the football game.
Mr. Dempsey is so hot.
After math class, Mr. Dempsey was totally flirting with me. I bet I could have made a move.
Ohmygod, please. You’re not special, he flirts with everyone.
I read through his profile again. Cory Dempsey. Profession: High School Principal.
Status: Single, never been married.
Likes: Basketball, fantasy football, surfing, inspiring the youth of today to become their very best selves.
Of course, Kristen came to mind immediately. We weren’t exactly friends—she was popular, and I was just the nobody who sat next to her in English class. But she’d always included me in group projects, and made sure to say hi in the hallways while everyone else’s eyes slid right over me, as if I were invisible.
To them, I’d been The Bag Lady because of the reusable grocery bag I used to carry my books, never able to justify the cost of a backpack. But Kristen had always defended me. “Don’t be an asshole,” she said once to Robbie Maxon. “Last week I saw you pick your nose in chem lab.”
She’d pulled the conversation away from me, directed it so masterfully that no one noticed me slip away, my heavy grocery bag cutting into my shoulder, grateful for her kindness.
“Why are you so nice to me?” I’d asked her once. We’d been alone in the bathroom, shoulder to shoulder at the sinks, me washing my hands while she applied lip gloss. Her eyes met mine in the mirror and she said, “It’s the girl code. We have to look out for each other because no one else will.”
And then, midyear, Kristen had simply vanished. One day she was in the seat next to mine, cracking jokes with her best friend, Laura Lazar, and the next, she was gone. At first, I figured she was just sick. But after a couple weeks it became clear she wasn’t coming back. No one seemed to know where she’d gone, or why.
Of course, people had their theories.
She went to boarding school in Switzerland.
She got a spot at Ms. Porter’s.
Her grandma was sick, so the family moved to Florida.
She got pregnant and went to one of those homes for unwed girls.
Laura Lazar had refused to talk about it, claiming she didn’t know. But I could tell she was lying. Laura knew why Kristen had left, and I thought I did too.
By high school, I’d mastered the art of blending in. Of finding corners where people wouldn’t notice the frayed edges of my thrift store clothes, or the fact that my hair was usually one day past needing a wash. And I saw things other people didn’t.
Like Kristen, slipping out of Mr. Dempsey’s classroom at lunchtime, cheeks flushed and hair slightly mussed, tugging at the hem of her skirt. Or the afternoon I saw her glance over her shoulder before sliding into the passenger seat of his car.
Nothing obvious, but enough to make me notice how subdued she’d become. How much harder her friends had to work to get her to join in their conversations.