“I’m not sure!” It comes out a tad shrill.
I wish Sawyer were anywhere else right now, but looking into Lizzie’s big hopeful eyes is like a breath of fresh air.
Smoothing her hair, I say, “I have to talk to your mom, but I’m getting tacos with a friend tomorrow, so I don’t know about dinnereverynight.”
She nods like she’s negotiating a business deal. “We can have dinnermostnights.”
With a deep inhalation, I say, “Let me talk to your mom first. Now go to class, I’ll see you later. Love you.” I give her one last squeeze.
“Love you!” She turns to Sawyer. I gape as he lifts his hand up just out of her reach, and she jumps up to slap it. “Bye, Principal Strong!”
“Later, Lizzie.”
She runs out the door, giant mermaid backpack bouncing on her back. She smacks into a kid and screeches “Sorry!” before running at full speed again.
“She’s klutzy like her aunt,” I sing under my breath before I can filter myself.
When I glance over, Sawyer’s face is tense and red climbs up his neck. Probably the effort to not insult me within earshot of a bunch of kids is causing his insides to melt.
As he bends to hover over the computer again, I notice the pattern on his tie for the first time as it dangles in front of him. Little rubber ducks.
What?
Shutting the laptop, he gestures for me to follow him out of the computer lab, and points in the direction we came from. “In case you forgot, the gym and cafeteria are back that way.”
He leads me toward the junction where all the colorful hallways meet. Red for Pre-K through first, blue for second and third, and yellow for fourth and fifth. As we approach, I tense up, remembering what else is here.
Pointing, he says, “Of course, you recall the library.”
“Yup. I remember.”
CHAPTER 3
FIFTH GRADE
BRIE
“You haveto put your sleeping bag next to mine,” Dev said. His chest was puffed up, spine straighter than normal.
I guess I’d been walking with better posture, too. All the fifth graders probably were that Saturday afternoon. We all felt older, more mature. Like we were finally being taken seriously by the world.
Sleeping over at the school library was a rite of passage for anyone who lived in town from even before my mom was a fifth grader. I was three when Gia did it, and I still remembered how her and Mom’s gleeful energy radiated throughout the house—getting Gia the newAladdinsleeping bag, a fresh pair of pajamas that were so bright they could have been Lisa Frank, and even a fluffy pair of slippers.
Gia had protested when Mom came home with the bags of brand new goods, but Mom gave her a look that brokered no argument. This is exactly why she worked so hard mopping floors and scrubbing toilets, she’d told her. The fifth grade sleepover was an inauguration of sorts, and Gia was going to have everything for it.
It was a core memory of mine.
And now that it was my turn, I was thrumming with anticipation. Even if I did have Gia’s ratty old sleeping bag. Her stained pajamas. Slippers that had worn through on the bottom in several spots.
None of that mattered, though. This made me feel closer to Mom than I had in a long time. Like if I could do this thing that had made her so alive with excitement before, it might feel like she were . . . simply alive again.
I shook away the thought. I wasn’t a baby. I knew how death worked. She wasn’t coming back, no matter how bad things were getting. In the years since Mom died, Dad had sunk lower and lower. I was old enough in fifth grade to be embarrassed by it, to understand that when adults whispered to one another as I passed them in town, they were talking about me. Old enough to notice the wordtrashwas tossed around an awful lot when I was around the rich kids.
It wasn’t until I was older that I realized Gia must have shielded Mara and me from the worst of it—taking us to the library after school, setting up playdates that I later suspected were babysitting gigs. Then, it would be my turn to shield Mara.
But in those moments, I was gleeful as my best friend Dev and I made our way to school.
Turning to Dev, I said, “You have to promise not to play any tricks on me.”
