Chapter Nineteen

August 27

I pull my phone out of my pocket as soon as I’m outside to check if there’s anything from Michael—but it’s dead. Obviously.

And that just makes me more frustrated. Frustrated that I forgot my phone would be dead, frustrated that now I have no idea

if Michael’s texted or tried to call me, frustrated that I basically just got in a fight with a younger version of myself

and I didn’t even win.

I catch up with my mom as she’s stepping out of Floyd’s with Mr. Grumpy, a roll of Bubble Wrap under one arm.

“Perfect timing!” she says. And then she frowns. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.” I shrug, restlessly tapping my fingers against my thumb. “Um... remember those books you wanted to give to Michael?”

Mom sighs. “Yes, yes, that’s still on my list.”

“What if I run them over now?”

She looks confused. “They’re back at the house.”

“Yeah, I know. I was thinking we could go back to the house and then I could take the books over to Michael’s in the Jeep.”

Her face lights up. “Oh! That would be very helpful of you, Darby. Then I could finally check that off.”

I’m fidgety the whole ride back to the house. Mom doesn’t pull the Jeep into the garage, just leaves it in the driveway, and

I practically shoot out of the car and into the house to get the boxes of books for Michael. There’s only two—banker boxes

with handles, which at least makes them slightly less awkward to wrestle into the trunk of the Jeep despite my tired arms.

“You told Michael about these, right?” I ask, as Mom helps me shove the last one in.

“Oh, I haven’t told him a thing,” she says.

Is she joking? “Why not?”

“Well, I was going to, but then I figured why give him the chance to say no? Just show up. He’ll be polite and take them.”

She beams. “And then they won’t be my problem anymore.”

I can’t tell if my mom is incredibly conflict avoidant or actually a mastermind at manipulating the laws of Midwest Nice.

But I don’t care. If the books give me an excuse to go over to Michael’s, that’s all that really matters.

It’s just after noon when I turn the Jeep into Michael’s long driveway, pulling up behind his old pickup truck, which glints

so brightly in the sun that I have to squint. Summer seems determined to make the most of the last few days of August, and

it’s hot and humid. The muggy air presses on me like a wet towel.

I open the trunk of the Jeep and realize there’s no way for me to carry both boxes by myself, so I just grab one, leave the

trunk open, and head for the house. A lone cicada picks up somewhere in the distance as I climb the porch steps. The lawn

chairs are still there; there’s a pair of flip-flops cast off under one of them and an abandoned soda can on the arm of another.

I hit the doorbell with my elbow. I hear it echo in the house, a mournful ping-pong . And then silence.

Great. Maybe nobody’s home. What do I do if Michael’s not even here? Leave the books? If I leave the books, that kind of gets

rid of my whole excuse for trying to talk to him...

The front door creaks opens and there, on the other side of the screen, is Michael. His hair looks very uncombed and he’s

wearing his glasses and a stretched-out T-shirt and shorts.

He stares at me like I’m the last person he expected to find on his porch. “Hi.”

His expression just makes me more annoyed. “Hi. I have books.”

“Books?”

“Yeah, my mom thought you might want these books she used to have in her classroom.” I look down at the box I’m carrying, mostly so I don’t have to look at Michael. “She’s trying to get rid of some stuff before the move, so...”

“Um. Right. Come on in.” Michael opens the screen door.

So I step over the threshold and set the box down in the entryway next to a pile of shoes. “There’s another one in the Jeep.”

“Oh,” Michael says.

I wait for him to say something else, but he doesn’t, so I turn and dodge past him, back out onto the porch. I grab the other

box from the Jeep, somehow wrangling the trunk closed, and when I climb the porch steps again, Michael has stepped outside

to hold the screen door open more easily and leave me more room to walk past him.

And that makes me annoyed too. Like it means he doesn’t want me too close.

I set the second box down next to the first. Michael steps back into the house, the screen door creaking closed behind him.

And now it’s just us, standing awkwardly and staring at each other while another cicada buzzes outside.

“So, will you take the books?” I ask.

He glances at the boxes. “Yeah, of course. Tell your mom thanks. I’m sure I can use them in my classroom... or another

teacher can.”

I let my breath out. I wanted him to put up a fight. To say he didn’t need the books or didn’t want them, just so I could

argue with him about something that wasn’t as raw as everything I actually want to say.

His eyes skip back to my face. “You, um... you just came to drop off the books?”

Does he really want me to leave that badly? “Fine. Point taken. I’m going.”

I start for the door, but he moves in front of it. “No. I’m sorry, that’s not what I meant. I just... I thought you were

here because...” He stuffs in his hands in the pockets of his shorts, shoulders creeping toward his ears. “Last night.”

I stare at him. I can’t decide whether to feel relieved or annoyed all over again. “So you didn’t just magically forget about

that.”

It comes out a bit sour and not at all like a question. He shrinks back, ducking his head. “No.” His voice is quiet. “I didn’t.”

“So... were you going to talk to me at some point? Or just ignore me all over again?”

Michael glances up, and his eyes look just as bare and vulnerable as they did in the bookstore, thirteen years ago when he

looked at Natalie and Brendan as they disappeared into the rows of shelves. “I didn’t mean to kiss you. Or... I didn’t

know I was going to before I did, and then I... I guess I kind of freaked out. I thought maybe I overstepped and you were

just...” He lets his breath out, running a hand over his face. He looks frustrated now too. “You had just gotten back,

and I wouldn’t normally do something like that at school, at a football game, and we’re complicated. The last thing I wanted

to do was make all of this more complicated...”

It takes everything I have not to shout, Why are we complicated? “So your great plan after kissing me was to hightail it out of there and hope I forgot by the next day?”

His face flushes. “No, that’s not—”

“Do you wish you hadn’t kissed me?”

His eyes meet mine. He hesitates, and then he says, “No.”

My heart rises in my chest, and all my frustration evaporates. “Could we just... stop being complicated, at least for now?”

My voice comes out rough. Cracking. “I know I’m a mess and I have no idea what I’m doing or even what I want, but I wanted

that. When you kissed me. I wanted that.”

Michael looks at me for a long time. I can hear my heart pounding through the seconds, so loud I’m half convinced he can hear

it too.

And then he takes a step forward, tentatively, like he’s giving me a chance to change my mind. His fingers run along my jaw

and he leans down and he kisses me again. I reach up and wrap my fingers around the back of his neck. I feel weightless and

like I’m careening over a cliff at the same time.

He pulls away and I let him go. I wait, holding my breath.

For a second, it seems like he’s holding his too. Then the corner of his mouth turns up. “We can stop being complicated for

now,” he says.

I smile back, but there’s a lump in my throat I can’t manage to swallow.

It’s not as easy as that, is it?

Because there’s still something he’s not telling me. I can feel it there, hovering around us like a shadow. And I’m sure it’s connected to everything Young Darby is missing in the bookstore. I’m sure it’s connected to that version of me feeling like a broken, messed-up weirdo, and to whatever is going to drive Michael and I apart at my birthday party.

But, god, I want it to be this easy.

Michael takes a breath. “I’m working on lesson plans and school stuff today, but... are you free tomorrow? Maybe we could

do something. Get coffee or go to Krape Park or—”

“Yeah.” Something sparks in my chest. “I’m free.”

A smile tugs at his mouth. “Okay. Krape Park? Four o’clock?”

“Sure.”

He leans down, and I turn my face up and kiss him again, just briefly. It sends a tingle down my back, the feel of his mouth

against mine. This person who was my best friend and seems like a stranger at the same time.

“I’ll see you tomorrow,” he says again, and opens the screen door.

I step back out onto the porch, that warm spark spreading through me at how familiar those words sound. “Yeah,” I say. “See

you tomorrow.”