Chapter 3

The next morning, a new video appeared in our class group chat. Audrey was wearing Mason’s navy team hoodie, sitting in a gaming chair in her basement. He had his back to the camera, curled up in a beanbag beside her.

The caption read: [Just like when we were little. He loses, then refuses to go home.]

I’d sewn the cuff of that hoodie last month. He’d caught my hand before I could trim the thread and told me to leave it a little long. He wanted proof I’d fixed it.

I set my phone on the bathroom counter and rinsed the toothpaste out of my mouth. Only when I looked up again did I realize how tightly I’d been holding my breath. There was breakfast waiting downstairs, but I didn’t wait around for Mason to come home.

Before school, I stopped at the shipping store to send ahead a few reference books that would make my suitcase too heavy. Then I went to my adviser’s office with the records I’d put together the night before.

He didn’t ask whether I’d had a fight with my boyfriend. He asked whether I’d approved the changes to my submission.

“No.”

“Then that’s what we deal with first. Don’t touch the shared files again. I’ll ask our IT teacher to preserve them.” He printed out the preliminary version. “Someone calling it a joke doesn’t erase the work you did.”

My throat tightened as I took the pages. I’d spent so much time trying to explain why I was upset that being asked a straightforward question nearly made me cry.

Outside his office, I ran into Mason and Audrey by my locker. Mason held out an iced peach tea. “Got this for you.” His eyes dropped to the pages in my hand. “You get everything back?”

“The submission’s on hold while they review it.”

He visibly relaxed. “See? I knew we could sort it out.”

I didn’t take the tea. Audrey reached to straighten the papers, and I closed the folder before she touched them. “Don’t.”

Her expression faltered. Mason pulled the drink back, rubbing his thumb hard against the side of the cup. “Do you have to be like that? She was practically crying over this last night.”

I locked the folder away and went to my last lab class.

That afternoon, the senior committee was taking down the display stands in the auditorium. I was returning some borrowed clip lights when Audrey offered to help, carrying a box of metal decorations toward me.

Something caught my backpack strap. I looked down and saw her hand hooked around it. I’d barely told her to let go when she stepped backward, pulling the display stand down with her.

I threw up my hand. A metal edge sliced across my palm, and Audrey landed on the floor, clutching her shin.

Mason ran up from the steps and helped her first. She was closer to him. “Nora, why didn’t you move?”

“She caught my bag.”

“I was trying to keep everything from falling.” Audrey sniffed. “I wasn’t trying to do anything else.”

He looked up at me and lowered his voice. “Just tell her it’s okay. Can we please not turn this into another fight?”

I opened my hand. Blood was running down between my fingers.

He froze, then reached for me. “You’re hurt, too? Let me see.”

Audrey sagged against him, saying the blood was making her dizzy. He couldn’t let her go without her falling, so he called for Tyler to get the nurse. “Sit down, okay? I’ll take her over and come right back.”

I didn’t sit. I handed the lights to the teacher supervising us and headed to the nurse’s office myself.

Mason caught up with me at the door and grabbed my backpack strap. “You didn’t wait for me. Again.”

“I need someone to look at my hand.”

“I never said I wasn’t going to help!” His voice rose, then he forced it down. “I was two minutes behind you. Now you’re looking at me like you don’t even know me.”

“If I hadn’t shown you my hand, would you have asked whether I was hurt?”

He didn’t answer right away. The nurse called my name, and I slipped the strap out of his fingers.

“If you really think I’m that bad,” he said suddenly, “maybe we should just take a break.”

I nodded and went inside.

The nurse cleaned the cut and checked my sore fingers, telling me to avoid heavy lifting for a few days. After signing the incident form, I saw his messages.

[How bad does it hurt? I asked Zoe to stay with you. I’ll pick you up later.]

Two minutes later: [Forget what I said. I’m just sick of us fighting.]

I looked at that second message for a while. He could bring up breaking up whenever he wanted, then take it back with a text. I was still trying to figure out which of his promises I was supposed to believe.

I told him I didn’t need a ride, tucked the folder into my backpack, and zipped it shut.

Zoe found me on the bench outside the nurse’s office. She saw the bandage and didn’t ask who’d started it this time. She just asked whether I wanted something to eat. Until then, I hadn’t noticed how hungry I was.

That evening, she drove me home past the school’s outdoor movie night. We could hear the music from the lawn before we reached it. Mason had promised to save the last slow dance of senior week for me.

But someone else’s video was already on my phone. He stood beneath the string lights, adjusting the projection screen for Audrey. She lifted his hand and spun under it to the music. Zoe glanced at me and waited, letting me decide whether to keep scrolling.

Mason had just posted: [Two hundred likes and I’m single. First one to cave loses.]

There were 199 hearts. Someone in the comments asked whether he could actually go through with it. His reply was right underneath: [Let’s see if a certain someone comes to find me first.]

He’d done this the last eight times, turning something we needed to talk through into entertainment for everyone else. I’d always called first. I hadn’t wanted to embarrass him, or let us keep hurting each other.

This time, I held my thumb over the heart, then tapped it. The number changed to 200. I took a screenshot and sent it to him with a message: [I’m taking you at your word. We’re done.]

My hand still hurt when Zoe pulled up to the porch. But as I got out of the car, I finally stopped rehearsing what I could say to make him listen.