“Drew go home?” I ask quickly, realizing how anxious I sound about it, so I start to busy myself with papers and my backpack and my computer screen angle.

“Uhm…” Lindsey says.

I know.

I keep my eyes down so she can’t see the truth, but I let my sigh fall out in a heavy breath.

“I asked him to stay…but he’s such a gentleman, he wanted me to make sure it was okay with you,” she says.

My body jerks with a slight laugh. Shaking my head, I lift my gaze to her as I swallow.

“What’s that look for?” she asks.

I have a look. Of course I have a look. Why is he doing this?

“Emma Brooklyn Burke, I’m a grown woman; if I want to sleep with a guy after the second date, then I’m going to,” she says, stepping to my door, gripping the side of it as she turns to face me. “I’ll tell him you said it’s fine.”

She glares at me as she shuts it behind her hard.

Time stops for a full minute. I don’t blink. I don’t breathe. There isn’t a sound to be heard, until the familiar click of her bedroom door across from mine.

I kick my things from my bed and let out a battle of grunts I try to keep quiet—my papers, computer, pens, and notecards all scattering around the foot of my bed into a mess below. The sensation doesn’t satisfy me, so I rip my blankets away too, crawling up on my knees as my fists grab at the sheets, pillows, and mattress pad, tearing the corner as I yank so hard it pulls up the corner of my mattress.

I wad everything into a ball and push it on top of my papers, leaving me in the center of my empty bed, breathing hard and numb, not knowing how to feel. I feel angry—angry with Andrew, and angry that I feel anything at all.

He left. He’s the one who left.

And now he’s here. And he’s gone. The boy he was…he’s gone.

I scramble to my feet, cramming my papers and computer back into my bag, shoving and kicking my pile of blankets out of the way. Stuffing my feet into my shoes, I pull the purple sweatshirt from my body, switching it out for a Tech one hanging on a hook behind my door. I grab my headphones, keys, and phone, then grab the purple sweatshirt and carry it with me out the door, pausing in the kitchen to step on the trash lever and throw the fucking sweatshirt away.

I let the main door slam closed behind me, locking up with a hard twist of my wrist as I bang my bag against the hallway wall on my way to the elevator. When I get outside, I look up and see a light still on in Lindsey’s window. After a few seconds, it goes out.

And all of my breath escapes me.

Chapter 9

Andrew Harper, Age 16

Dear Emma,

I’m losing myself. For the first two months, I swore that wouldn’t happen. I said it every night before sleep; I woke up reminding myself of who I was.

I haven’t done that in days now…maybe weeks.

I’m letting go, whether I want to or not. I don’t care, and that scares me a little. Not caring? It’s liberating. It’s lonely.

There’s a guy here; he’s 18. His name’s Kingston, but most of the “students” here call him King. They say he was in some gang or something; that he used to sell drugs. He has tats all over his fingers and the rumor is he drove a getaway car for his older brother during some armed robbery over in Rockford. I’m not sure if he was really all that tough before he showed up here, but he sort of took the lead. A lot of the other guys let him. They buy the stories—his self-made hype.

He doesn’t like me.

I don’t like him.

Apparently, he’s not used to people telling him no. I tell him no a lot. Last week, when I told him no, he snuck into my room at night and put a pillow over my face. He’s pulled shit with me before, tripping me at lunch and sucker punching me around corners. This time, though…I was ready. I stabbed him with a pen, dug it into his side and held it there. I thought that’d make him stop right away. But he just pushed the pillow into my face harder. The harder I fought, the stronger he was. And for a moment, I was losing.

I almost gave in. Just…let him take me. But something made me keep fighting.

I struggled enough to wake someone across the hall, and then the guard set the alarms off and another person pulled him from me. I lost my phone privileges for an extra month for stabbing him. I got extra therapy sessions too, to talk about my aggression. Fucker tried to kill me; pretty sure aggression was the only way to go with that.

King got a trip to the emergency room and an overnight at the hospital. Funny thing, it was phone day today, and I saw him making his calls. I guess a pen weighs more than a pillow in this fucked-up court of justice I’m stuck in.