“I know that.”

“It’s not what he said. It’s that he was stone-cold sober, and he insulted the one person he’d found out I care about. A couple of weeks ago when you came to the Crab Lab with Aidan, my brother saw that I was upset and figured out you were why. He told my dad about it. My dad went out of his way to make a comment, not to insult you, but to hurt me. People who love each other don’t do that.”

“So you’re not going to live with someone who doesn’t love you,” I said slowly. “Maybe that’s too much to expect. Maybe you move back in with him until May because you need a place to live and he’s your father. As for the rest . . . maybe that comes with age.”

He looked out the window onto the busy street, considering. Candlelight flickered across his face, glinting in the blond stubble on his chin. I wondered how old we would both grow before we got along with our parents and won the chance to date like everybody else.

“You need a roof over your head,” I said, “and you need to eat. You can’t do well at school or at work while you’re worried about those basics. If you’re determined to make a success of yourself, you need to start taking care of yourself first.”

“That’s exactly what Ms. Malone told me.” He surprised me by standing, leaning across the table, and capturing my lips with his. As he sat back down, he promised me, “I’ll think about it.”

14

THE FOLLOWING AFTERNOON, JUST AS I was sitting my royal ass down on my crepe-paper throne in preparation for the parade, Sawyer came around the corner of the school dressed as the pelican. When he saw me, he jumped about two feet and threw up his wings in exaggerated surprise, then slapped his glove to his chest like he was having a heart attack.

I knew why. I’d changed my hair again.

The homecoming parade was a big deal in this town—because we didn’t have that many big deals. So many people were in it that I was always surprised there was anyone left to watch it. And the school, which forced us to make up hurricane days, didn’t mind letting half the student body out of last period to line up for marching band, suit up for dance troupes, and gussie up for waving at the crowd from elaborate constructions of wood and chicken wire.

That’s why Chelsea, after she’d donned her majorette leotard and pushed her tiara into place, had time to help me pick out my hair. I was going full Afro.

“And the final touch.” She slid my official homecoming queen tiara into my round hair, making a dent. She squinted at me in the mirror. “Wow, I didn’t know it would be so . . . big.”

“Me neither,” I admitted. In fact, I was having second thoughts about appearing in public like this, but there was no time for a redo. “What am I saying with this?”

“Well, for one thing, you’re giving Aidan a big ‘up yours’ for making a comment about your hair a few weeks ago.” She shot the mirror the bird.

“True.” I hadn’t said anything to Aidan about calling the cops on Sawyer. I had no proof, for one thing. And hardly anyone in the school seemed to have heard about the incident. I wanted to keep it that way. No need to provoke him.

But if he hadn’t liked my big hair before, huge hair certainly let him know how much I cared about his opinion.

“You’re also telling the school how you feel about having to struggle so hard just to hold a homecoming dance.”

“I like it,” I proclaimed, even though I didn’t.

And so, a few minutes later when Sawyer fell on the ground and played dead in the sunshine, I knew why. I called, “Is it that bad?”

He leaped onto the float and took his head off—something he almost never did once he was in costume. Crepe paper crackled as he slid into place on the throne next to me. “I love it,” he said, taking off a glove to slide his fingers into the back of my hair.

Of course he would love it. I felt myself glowing inside.

“It’s fragile,” I warned him, my voice trembling as he touched me. “It’ll only stay this way for a short time.”

“Like seaborgium,” he suggested.

I laughed in an unregal way at this periodic table joke from nowhere. “It does look like a hairstyle that would have a radioactive half-life,” I agreed. “It’s for special occasions.”

“This hair is a special occasion,” he said. “It is its own holiday.”

“With its own zip code,” I agreed. “I’ll disassemble it before tonight. It would never survive a back handspring.”

“That’s a shame.” He moved toward me, his eyelids lowered sexily.

“Wait, lipstick, mmmm . . . ,” I said as he kissed me.

I heard the familiar click of Harper’s camera, and I broke the kiss in alarm.

“Sorry!” Harper called from the front of the float. She was wearing the cute clothes that had become her work uniform lately, cargo pants and a tight tank top, with the addition of her retro glasses. “I know I keep doing this to y’all, but I can’t stand to miss a great shot. And your hair!”

“You won’t put that in the yearbook, will you?” I pleaded. “You have to delete it. My mother can’t see me kissing Sawyer.”

“I’m not going to delete it!” she exclaimed, outraged. “But I’ll put it in my ‘Kaye’s mom can’t see this’ file. Which is growing.” Already spying another great shot, she wandered off without saying good-bye.