Page 21 of On His Mind

I didn’t know that one existed, so I follow him out. We walk down the stairs, down the hall, and out the side door. The side step is cracked concrete tucked between the house and the hedge. Two people fit if neither of them is precious about personal space. The air out here is cold enough for Blue to shiver. It smells like wet leaves, spilled beer and, faintly, somebody’s cigarette.

Blue sits down first. I sit at the other end and leave a foot between us.

Neither of us says anything for a while, and it’s the easiest four minutes of my night.

Through the window we’ve got a cross-section of the living room, like a dollhouse with one wall off. Stanley talking with his whole body. Benson nodding along to the music with a beer, not saying much, watching everybody. Rowan standing at the edge with a cup, which appears to be his entire personality at parties. Four seniors folded over each other laughing at something. Somewhere in there is Theo, and somewhere in there is a girl in a navy dress, and I make myself not go looking.

The crowd starts shoving back. Stanley’s got both arms out, herding people toward the walls, and two of the upperclassmen are helping him clear a lane.

“Looks like the year’s off to a good start,” Blue says.

Stanley climbs up onto the couch.

“What’s he doing?”

Blue murmurs, “I don’t know.”

Stanley does a standing backflip off the couch.

He lands it. The whole room comes apart — forty people converging on one guy, and the sound gets through the window.

“Wow,” I say.

“Yeah.”

The team’s jumping. Stanley’s jumping in the middle of them with his shirt half over his head. Then the entire house screams, “Shots,” in one voice and stampedes for the kitchen.

“They do this every home game, apparently,” Blue says.

“Yay.”

It gets a short laugh out of him. Something in my chest lets go about a quarter inch.

I turn away from the window, put my head back against the siding, and breathe in air that hasn’t been used.

In for four. Hold for four. Out for six.

Tomorrow there’s lifting at six. Next week there’s classes. Then there’s ice, a whistle, and eighty feet of rink. I can make it to that.

Something goes over in the kitchen. Glass, from the sound of it.

Benson roars, “Stanley!”

Blue doesn’t move.

“Welcome to Hawthorne,” he says.

I nod.

Chapter 4

Penelope

Somebodyyells,“Shots!”

The whole house erupts, screaming as everyone rushes to the kitchen. Bodies are squeezing through the doorway in a wave of hockey players and girls laughing into red cups.

Stanley, who is either the funniest person in this house or the biggest liability, vaults over the back of the couch instead of walking around it, lands with both feet, throws his arms into the air, and nearly takes someone out.