“Oh no!” Delia gasped.

“Do they not know how bad you are at that stuff?” Shay asked, equally horrified.

“I tried to tell them!” Well, I hadn’t tried very hard because I really did want to please Ms. Gladwell and keep my job. This probably had something to do with my childhood, but I didn’t have any time to unpack it just then. “You guys could help me!”

“Sorry, but I’m already in charge of organizing the donated toys for children’s charities,” Shay said. “And Delia’s running the ice-fishing booth. We’ve all got to pay our dues.”

I could tell the moment Owen walked in the room because of the look on Shay’s face and the fact that the temperature dropped twenty degrees. I knew he was currently mad at her because she was threatening to fail the quarterback, which would mean he couldn’t play Friday’s game.

While I’d never gotten the full story of everything that had happened between those two, I knew it was bad. One night when Shay had been overly tipsy (her term, not mine), she had confessed that if she ever found herself in some life-threatening situation she was going to write Owen’s name on her body with a Sharpie pen just so that he’d be the primary suspect. She later claimed to have been joking, but . . .

“Look at that, there’s the new substi-cute teacher taking over Jennifer’s class.” Delia pointed across the room to a good-looking guy in his late twenties. “His name is Kyle. I think maybe he should be my new boyfriend.”

My phone buzzed before I could properly assess Kyle. It was a text from Brad. I tried not to groan. He was supposed to be leaving me alone.

“From Brad? We should talk. I thought you guys were done. What is this?” Shay demanded.

Too late I realized that I hadn’t thought to cover up my screen in case something like this happened. My hand flew up to cover the message even though the damage had already been done. “It’s just—”

Her hand dropped to my wrist, where she noticed Brad’s bracelet. I didn’t know what had possessed me to put it on that morning. It didn’t mean anything. I had just . . . wanted to wear something sparkly.

The hope that when Tyler got back he might notice it, might even ask where it had come from, maybe have a twang of jealousy about it?

Yeah, that had crossed my mind.

But considering that I couldn’t be with him, I couldn’t exactly confess my ulterior motives to my friends.

Shay said, “Where did this bracelet come from? And know there are only two acceptable answers here. One is from Tyler in his quest to convince you to become his girlfriend and the other is in your mother’s couch cushions.”

I couldn’t have lied to Shay even if I wanted to. Not only because she was my friend, but because she’d always been able to see right through me.

It was annoying.

Covering up my wrist with my sleeve I said, “It was a gift.”

“From bad Brad?” Shay had never liked Brad, and with good reason. The first time they’d met, he’d hit on her. I wasn’t around and they didn’t know who the other one was. He approached her saying, “Hey. My name is Brad. What’s yours?”

“Not interested.”

He didn’t take the hint. “You look like a good girl. I make good girls go Brad.”

She had rolled her eyes, trying to ignore him.

“Come on, I’ll be the best you’ve ever Brad.”

“No thanks. You’ve left a Brad taste in my mouth.”

He’d somehow seen this as a sign of interest. “That’s the idea.”

She got rid of him by telling him to go away before she harmed the protruding parts of his body. When she told me later, after I had properly introduced them, I knew it was true. Partly because of the idiotic punning, but also because it wasn’t the first time he’d done something like that. When I’d confronted him, he tried to play it off like he’d known exactly who she was and it was a joke/misunderstanding. He’d said by way of excuse, “Like I’d ever hook up with a girl who had purple hair.”

The truth was, Brad cheated on me constantly. I would find out, he would beg for forgiveness and promise to never do it again. Then my parents would start in, telling me to take him back, that sometimes men couldn’t help themselves, that everybody was human and made mistakes. And I did it. I kept taking him back. Over and over again.

I’d often wondered how many times he’d cheated when I hadn’t caught him or heard about it from someone else.

Shay said, “It is from Brad. Why on earth would you accept?”

Reminding myself of all that had happened before should have convinced me that I was being dumb; instead it only made me slightly defensive. Like when you knew you were wrong but dug your heels in anyway because you were embarrassed. “What? How could I refuse?”

“Oh, I don’t know, maybe with your dignity and self-respect still intact? You don’t even like this guy. So much for you being over dating rich guys. Why are you accepting presents from him?”

“I . . . I don’t know.” Because it had been so long since I’d had something pretty? I knew how shallow and petty that would sound. “It’s over. We both know it’s over.”

“Are you sure?” she asked, pointing at my wrist.

“Yes. And now I have this token to remember. It wasn’t all bad.”

“And what, you think the good outweighs the Brad? And you still haven’t explained how you got the bracelet.”

“He came to see me at my parents’ house. You know, the night when I moved into Tyler’s. Anyway, that’s when he gave it to me. He apologized and promised to change and said he would be committed to me now.”

Shay narrowed her eyes at me. “Does he know what the word committed means? Like, he understands that he has to stop having sex with other women, right?”

“He knows.” At least, I hoped he did.

She shook her head. “I’ll fall in love with Owen James before Brad is faithful to you.”

Delia put her hand on mine. “But you guys broke up, right? I didn’t hallucinate that part?”

“No. You didn’t. It’s definitely over. He said he’d give me space.” Something he was failing miserably at.

I could see Shay winding up, could already imagine the words that she was going to say. But Delia’s uncharacteristically snarky response shocked all of us. “Give you space? Well, he’s good at that already.”

“Nice.” Shay nodded.

As if he somehow sensed that we were talking about him, another message buzzed in.

“Unless he’s thinking of you moving on with someone else, he should just be quiet,” Shay said.

Ms. Gladwell entered the room, raising both of her hands. “If I could have your attention please, I would like to start the meeting.”

As the room began to quiet down, I wondered if I needed to make things clearer to Brad. That maybe I hadn’t been as definitive as I could have been, since some teeny part of me hadn’t wanted to write him off publicly and risk the wrath of my mother. Both of my parents would react so badly. But could things really get worse? I hadn’t been invited home for Thanksgiving. While I’d had a great day with Shay and her mom, part of me had missed being at home. They had effectively written me off and had only called me when they wanted something from me. They’d dangled Brad and a possible relationship with them in front of me like a carrot.