I go to dinner and Misty says she’ll drag Logan’s ass down to one of the volunteer counseling sessions she does for drug addiction, and the people there will scare the weed right out of his system. She’s also going to talk to my dad, ask permission to collect a sample of Logan’s piss every day for twenty-one days.

Dad agrees.

Logan gets so mad.

By the final day, his urine is crystal clean.

Yay, teamwork!

Between building shit for the set, track meets, training, family, I barely have time to breathe, but you know what? Laney was right. I am great at it, and Laney and I do get to spend a lot of time together.

Old times have become now times and small talk is purely conversation. Even when it comes to Cooper. “You heading to UNC this weekend or is Cooper coming home?” I ask, sitting opposite her, our legs crossed, making flowers out of tissue paper and wire. Hers look like they belong in a museum. Mine look like dog shit. Meanwhile, Leo, Logan and Garray attempt to piece together the set for the infamous balcony scene.

“I’m not sure,” she mumbles, looking at the time.

I look at the time, too. It’s 4:48 on a Thursday afternoon and my crew, she, and I are the only ones left in the drama room. Miss Lepsitch, the drama teacher, should be here, too. But she’s probably sucking face with Coach Anderman in a broom closet somewhere. “Are you waiting for him to call?” I push.

She shrugs, focuses on the flower that’s already done. She doesn’t really talk much about him anymore, at least not to me, and whether that’s a conscious decision she’s made or the hype of him has worn off, I’m not sure.

“You guys are still together, right?” I try, digging for more information.

“Yeah,” she says quickly. “We’re still together. It’s just hard… you know…” She glances up at me, searches for a reaction. She won’t see anything. No anger. No spite. Hell, it took Ben and Felicity what literally felt like an eternity to finally get their shit together. Four seasons and one abrupt ending and I still don’t have closure. But I did learn that my best tactic was to wait. And so waiting is what I’m doing. Plus, my mom was a big believer in fate. If it was meant to be, it would happen. Eventually.

“Are you missing him?” I ask.

She clears her throat, looks up at me, her eyes glazed.

Shit. “Did I say something?”

Her head moves, side to side, slowly, slowly. “There’s so much I want to tell you,” she breathes. “But it’s…”

I shuffle closer, place my hands on her knees. “It’s what, Lane?”

Her throat bobs with her swallow and she looks away. “It’s…”

I hear footsteps approaching, but I’m too focused, too addicted to turn to the sound. “Lane?” I push, squeezing her knees.

“Lois?” Fuck you, Cooper Kennedy.

Her eyes are huge, her breath caught in her throat while Cooper stands above me like an angry giant, clenching and unclenching his fists. “Get your hands off my girlfriend, Preston.”

Laney pushes my hands away. “I didn’t know… you didn’t say…” She stumbles to her feet and stands between Cooper and me, her hands on his chest, protecting me. “Let’s go, Coop.”

I don’t need her fucking protection and I stand, my chest out, shoulders square and look down on him. “We’re just friends, asshole!”

“You touch all your friends like that?” he spits, his words echoing through the room.

The guys hear his bullshit and come running. Leo gets between us. “Leave it alone, man,” he says to me, his tone calm. He should be Leonardo, the ninja turtle. The smart, tranquil, leader of the brotherhood.

“What the fuck’s going on?” Garray snaps.

Lane tugs on Cooper’s arm, forcing him toward the door. They’re almost out when Logan shouts, his hands cupped around his mouth, “Pedophile alert!”

I wait three hours and forty-six minutes to text Lane from Leo’s phone.

Leo: I’m sorry about what Logan said. He was out of line. Are we still on to finish up the set tomorrow afternoon? -CK

That’s what our friendship has become, sneaking in text messages and signing off in code (CK = Clark Kent) to settle her boyfriend’s jealousy and keep the peace with them.

It takes her nine minutes to respond.

Lane: It’s okay. It’s not your fault. It’s mine. I shouldn’t have let Lucas touch me like that. I know that now. I’ll see you tomorrow at 3 pm. Great job, today! Thanks for everything, Leo.

I give Leo back his phone and don’t bother with a reply, because what the fuck, Lane?

She doesn’t show the next day.

She doesn’t call, doesn’t text, doesn’t email.

She’s not at school Monday, so I make contact with her.

Leo: You sick or something? Need me to come around? - CK.

Lane: No.

Lane: I’m not home.

Lane: I won’t be at school for a couple of days, but I’m okay. Thanks for checking in, Leo.

It’s not just a couple of days she’s off school. It’s an entire week. I call Brian, ask how she is and he tells me that she got a horrible flu when she was at UNC over the weekend. She’s so sick that she can’t even come home. She’s holed up in his dorm room but it’s fine, he tells me, because Cooper’s there and he’s taking care of her. I wonder if Brian knows about New Year’s Eve and the houseboat and Cooper’s lack of taking care of her then—one night. How the hell has he taken care of her for an entire week?

If I didn’t have to finish these stupid sets and compete in a race and take the twins to basketball and then Lachlan to a birthday party and hand deliver Logan’s now-weekly piss cup to Misty at the police station, my ass would be in my truck, driving to UNC, punching Cooper in the face (fuck, I want to do that so bad) and throwing Laney over my shoulder to take her home. She’d sit in my apartment and I’d take care of her. Soup, meds and back rubs. I’d nurse her back to health and she’d call me her hero and she’d dump Cooper and then we’d have sex on the bed where I put the final nail in the coffin of bringing her back to life. Shit. I’m Dad with a dog story and there was my tangent.

But, I do have to do all those things, and I can’t even call her to see how she is because that fucker still has me blocked.

Monday rolls around, opening night, and everyone involved in the play, including Miss Lepsitch, is going out of their ever-loving minds because the costumes! Where the fuck are the costumes? I begin to panic as much as everyone else because now I feel like I’m part of this insanity called The Spring Play, and dammit, I worked hard for it. In the afternoon, Leo tries calling Lane. Garray tries calling Lane. Even I try calling Lane—it doesn’t even ring. Logan sits on a makeshift throne made for King Capulet, or Sir Capulet, or whatever the fuck Juliet’s dad was, and says, “You know, maybe Cooper’s one of those crazy cats who’s, like, stupid obsessed with our little Laney, and he’s got her hidden in a dungeon or something. She probably loves him because of that… what’s it called? You know that thing…” He clicks his fingers while my brain throbs. “When the captured fall for their captor?”