Page 28 of People Like Us

I was sitting on the bench between the rows of lockers, my phone’s camera open as it sat propped up against my bag so I could use it as a mirror to do my makeup in. I’d gotten really good at blow drying my hair, and contouring my face in less than twenty minutes.

The door to the locker room swung open, banging against the tiled wall as two girls entered, giggling.

“Easy with the door!” Coach Martinelli yelled from her office.

“Sorry!” Lindsey and Emily said in unison as they rounded the corner.

“Anyway, she’s a total slut, and she deserves it,” Emily said. Lindsey hummed in agreement.

“Who’s a slut?” I asked, buttoning my pressed ivory shirt.

“Pennelope,” Lindsey informed me. “The cheer squad’s planning to jump her after the game Friday. You in?”

I looked up at her as I zipped the side of my brown pencil skirt over my pantyhose. “Are you serious?” I asked.

She nodded and gave me a look that implied I’d asked a dumb question.

“I don’t even know who that is.”

“Yes, you do. She’s that goth chick who hangs out with the other misfits in the courtyard at lunch,” Emily said, as if that narrowed it down.

“She’s got purple hair,” Lindsey clarified, and I shrugged to show I still had no idea who they meant.

“Why are you jumping her?” I asked, stuffing my knee-high sock into my tall brown boot so I could yank the zipper shut. I’d convinced Denise to get me these boots at a yard sale this summer. But the zipper on them always jammed, and sometimes scratched the blue paint on my nails, so I didn’t wear them as often as I promised I would.

“I think she’s got a thing for Jack,” Emily said, as though that justified everything.

“You think? You’re going to jump a girl you don’t know over something you’re not even sure is true?” I asked, staring as she tightened her blonde ponytail.

Emily hadn’t always been this aggressive. But spending two months at a sleep away camp that summer had changed something in her. Lindsey joked that Emily had gone into withdrawal from not being allowed lipgloss for so long, and was still recovering, but I wasn’t so sure.

“Yes,” she said sternly. “Are you in or not?”

I slung my bag over my shoulder and said, “Can’t. My dad signed me up for some charity thing at church, so I’m not even going to the game.”

Lindsey’s frown deepened comically. “Fuck the charity. We need you.”

“All right, I’ll tell my dad to fuck the charity, Linds,” I said over my shoulder.

Mrs. Martinelli was sitting at her desk in the office by the door, shooting me a disappointed look as I walked past. I leaned into the small room and whispered, “I’ll take care of it.”

She whispered back, “You’re a good kid.”

I winked at her and headed to wait outside Mrs. Deal’s door for the bell to ring. When I got there, August was leaning with his shoulder against the doorframe, facing my direction.

I leaned against the wall, his mirror image. We were alone in the hall, and he handed me the same thermos of coffee he’d brought me every day since the first time as he said: “Good morning.”

“Good morning,” I echoed just before I took a long pull from the hot coffee.

“Good?” he asked, jutting his chin toward the cup.

“Perfect,” I smiled.

“Your boot is unzipped,” he said, pointing at my left foot.

“I know that,” I answered pointedly, raising my eyebrow in question.

He knelt instantly, one knee bent up. He took hold of my ankle and raised it carefully to put the bottom of my shoe against his thigh. The position caused my skirt to hike up my leg, and he could easily have looked up my skirt if he wanted to, but he didn’t. Instead, his eyes stayed locked on mine as he placed his finger on the inside of the zipper and dragged it upward with ease.