I thought what happened with Hosea might be a one-time thing. We’ve been texting, but we haven’t seen each other outside of ballet or random hallway sightings at school. And it would be the right thing to do—to stop seeing him before I fall too far. Yet a big part of me hopes that kissing him, that being with him, wasn’t a one-time thing. We would be good together—I know it—so I wish guilt didn’t rush through my veins every time I think about being That Girl. Because I don’t know if it’s a title I’d ever be comfortable owning.

Then, the Monday after Halloween, he texts me.

It comes through a few seconds after the lunch bell, so I read it as everyone is rushing out of English, toward the cafeteria. I stand at my desk and pull up his message with shaking fingers.

Meet me in the old science lab? I want to see you.

The old lab. Of course. No one ever uses it. I cover my smile with my hand, but I can’t do anything about the goose bumps that prickle along my arms as I text him back:

See you there.

It was too fast. Maybe I should have waited a little bit, left him wondering. But I couldn’t have stopped myself, even if I’d wanted to.

I shoot Sara-Kate a quick text that says I have to study during lunch, then duck into the nearest bathroom for a quick mirror check. I put on a fresh coat of lip gloss. Stop. Really look at myself. And it’s strange. The same old me looking back as always—dark eyes, thick hair, skin a warm brown with reddish undertones. But for the first time in a long time, I look . . . happy.

I peek out into the hall to make sure it’s empty, then book it to the science lab. It’s more of a supply room, really. No one has class here anymore after some super-brainy kid’s parents donated a ton of money to build a new lab a few years ago.

I take a deep breath when I’m standing outside the door. Smooth my hands over my fitted white button-down with the tiny yellow flowers, look down at my dark jeans to make sure they’re still tucked snugly into my boots.

The knob turns easily. I step in, close the door behind me, lean my back against it as I search the room for him. Or maybe I’m here first? But I follow the rustling sound to the far left corner and there he is.

We look at each other for a long second. He smiles and I smile and we walk toward each other until we meet in the middle.

“Hi,” I say when we’re so close the toes of our boots are touching.

“Hi.” He removes his hands from the front pocket of his hoodie. Traces my collarbone and lingers there only slightly before his hand slides up my neck and along the line of my jaw. His thumb strokes my earlobe and I lean into his palm, move closer, shut my eyes as I give myself to the moment.

Our first kiss is soft. Sweet. Short.

“I’m glad you came,” he murmurs, our lips inches apart.

“Me too,” I breathe back, wondering how such a small kiss can leave me so flustered. “But how’d you think of the lab? Shouldn’t this room be locked up?” I look at the microscopes and Bunsen burners and boxes of rock samples perched on the tables around us. The light that manages to shine through the hazy windows reveals that everything is covered in a thick layer of dust.

His body heat melds into mine. Does he know my heart is pounding double time? Can he feel how I feel about him?

“Should be. Never is.” He shrugs. “Gas is turned off on the tables and they took out all the chemicals. Klein told me about it a while ago.”

“Does he still come here?” I look toward the door, wondering if this is too good to be true. I never would have thought to meet up here, but I’ve only recently become a person with so many things to hide.

“We’re fine.” He takes my hand in his. Squeezes. “I promise.”

We move farther into the room and off to the side. My back against the edge of a lab table, his arms braced on either side of mine as he presses against me. My hands are cold. I look at him as I slip them between his hoodie and T-shirt so they’re sitting at his waist. His mouth turns up in a slow grin as he leans in to kiss my neck.

“Hosea.” I say his name quietly, but he stops. Looks at me as I wait for the right words to come. “Do . . . do you bring her here?”

His eyebrows lift in surprise. “Ellie? No.” He pauses. “Never.”

Of course not. He doesn’t have to bring her here, because she’s his girlfriend. They can be together anytime they want; they don’t have to sneak around.

“Hey.” He tilts his head to the side a little, his gray eyes soft. “What’s wrong?”

I look down at my hands still resting on his waist. “Nothing, I . . .”

I’m being stupid.

I should just enjoy this.

I shouldn’t be upset that you’re with her.

“This can be our place . . . if you want,” he says, his gaze locked firmly on me. “Just you and me, okay?”

I nod. And I know it means I’m saying that what we’re doing could happen again, that I’m not strong enough to resist him. But these feelings aren’t going to disappear. I like these feelings. I was afraid I’d never have them again, after Chris. And besides, right now, all I want is to say yes to Hosea.

“Okay?” he says again. He’s still looking at me and we share a private smile that sends ribbons of warmth dancing through me.

“Okay.” Maybe it’s not so bad being That Girl.

I tip my head back and close my eyes and his mouth comes down on mine, soft and warm and familiar.

At least That Girl gets what she wants.

* * *

My lips are swollen when I leave the science lab.

We kept all our clothes on, but our hands were busy. My shirt is rumpled. Bunched in weird places. I tug it down at the bottom and decide to stop off in the bathroom for another mirror check. I left first and Hosea will follow in a little bit, just to be safe.

There are still a few minutes before lunch ends, so I figure the bathroom will be empty—but I figure wrong. Lark Pearson is standing at the far end of the room in front of the sinks, reapplying her eyeliner. She leans forward in a way that makes her ass stick out, emphasizing the fit of her painted-on jeans.

She gives me a long look in the mirror as the door closes behind me. I wait for her to speak, but she never turns around, and then finally, she looks away. I keep an eye on her as I move toward the farthest stall, and still she doesn’t say a word. Just stares straight ahead at her reflection as she rims the lids of her blue eyes with layers and layers of black liner.

I step into the stall with every intention of staying in here until she leaves. Even if it makes me late to my next class. I’ve closed the door, am just getting ready to slide the lock into place when her voice echoes out across the room.

“Got any more smokes?”

I freeze. There’s no pretending I didn’t hear her. We’re the only ones in here. I crack the stall door to look at her. “What?”

Lark drops the tube of eyeliner in her purse, then turns around and flutters a hand in the general direction of my chest. “Cloves. Got any more?”

Shit.

How could I forget? Hosea gave me one before we left the lab. “To remember me by,” he’d said, pecking my lips as he tucked it into the triangular pocket of my button-down.

And now it’s just sitting there, poking out of my shirt like I’m marking my territory.

I ignore the bad feeling that blooms in my chest as I shrug. “Sorry, it’s my last one.”

I start to close myself into the stall again as Lark makes her way to the door, but she pauses in front of me. Puts her hand on the edge of the stall door before I can fully shut it. Shit.

“Since when do you smoke cloves?” Her raccoon eyes are scary up close as they assess me.

“I’ve always smoked cloves,” I say, forcing myself to not look away from her. “When they’re around.”

“Well, the only person I know who smokes cloves around here is Hosea.” Lark squints at me and her breath smells faintly of old coffee and I wish more than anything that someone would walk in and save me.

“Maybe you should know more people,” I respond with another shrug. Calm and cool. Totally relaxed, like my palms aren’t sweating.

Her mouth falls open, but she recovers quickly. “Bitch,” she says in a loud, clear voice before she slinks out of the bathroom.

I snap the clove in half, watch the two ends swirl down the toilet bowl as I flush away the evidence.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

THE RAINBOW DIET IS WHAT DID ME IN.

I’d been gradually cutting back on everything. It started with processed foods, then baked goods, then pasta and rice and bread. I never went to the trouble of pretending to be a vegetarian—even my parents couldn’t argue that cutting out red meat and pork was a bad thing.

But the rainbow diet was another beast. I found it on a pro-ana site. It was easy enough to follow, in theory. Mom already bought most of the fruits and vegetables on the list, and neither she nor Dad would be suspicious if they saw me eating more produce.

It was hard when I had to eat dinner with them every night, so I started staying at the studio late, or saying I’d eaten at Phil’s or Sara-Kate’s, or that I didn’t feel well and it would be better if I went to bed without supper.

I managed to keep it up for almost two straight weeks. The days were separated into colors: red produce on one day, white on another, and green and orange and yellow and purple. No more than 300 calories a day if I planned it just right. Wednesdays were the hardest. That’s when I fasted completely, when I could have nothing more than water. I danced on those nights, too, and I was so proud of myself when I finished, when no one had figured out that I hadn’t eaten since the evening before.

The second Wednesday was the one that gave me away. It was late June but already the days were so hot and humid that you wanted to take a shower as soon as you stepped out the front door. Phil and I had begged his mother to drop us off at the mall instead of the pool with her and his younger brother, Glenn. She protested at first; all of us were getting used to Donovan’s absence and parents were still nervous about leaving their kids unsupervised. He’d only been gone for a couple of months. Almost as long as it had been since I’d last seen Chris.

But we begged until Mrs. Muñoz called Mom to make sure it was okay with her. It was. She was just as nervous as Phil’s mother but I’d heard her and Dad talking once when they thought I was upstairs. She’d said they couldn’t let the fear control us, that we had to keep living our lives and not give anyone that power. So as much as it pained her, she let me go to the mall that day with Phil.

Mrs. Muñoz stared both of us down as she dropped us off in front of the movie theater/food court wing. “You keep your cell phones on and pick up if you see me calling, no exceptions. And do not talk to anyone you don’t know. Also no exceptions.”

“Ma, we’ll be right here at four o’clock,” Phil said before he kissed her on the cheek. “Three fifty-nine, even.”

I was pretty sure she had tears in her eyes as she drove away.

I knew for a fact that Phil had only gotten out of bed at eleven, a half hour before they picked me up, but his first stop was still the food court. I had mixed feelings about the food court. One part of me wanted to stand in the middle and revel in the decadent smells—fried chicken strips and enormous slices of greasy pepperoni pizza and creamy frozen yogurt and thick-cut waffle fries. It wasn’t what I needed to smell on a Wednesday, my fasting day.

But the other part of me was frozen with fear, because everything about the food court reminded me of Chris: the fast-food wrappers balled up in the corners of his car, the fountain sodas that took up residence in the sticky cup holders of the console. Even the stacks of thin paper napkins on the tables made me think of him. He always kept a bunch in his glove compartment; he used them to wipe himself off after we’d finished having sex.

“I’m getting a gyro to start out.” Phil took a step toward the Greek place, but his eyes were all over the food court. “Maybe a corn dog before my mom picks us up. Or tacos. And fries. A shitload of fries. What are you having?”

I didn’t answer. My stomach was growling so loudly, I could barely hear myself think. I pinched. Directly under my ribs on my right side. For one, two, three, then four beats. It was a little after noon, so I only had a few more hours until I could eat again. Seventeen more hours, to be precise. But I’d be sleeping for seven of those, so really just ten more hours.