When Best Friends Kiss
By senior year, I had been offered a full scholarship for a master's program—and after that, a PhD track.
People in the department called me a prodigy. I didn't feel like a prodigy. I felt like a girl who loved science more than anything, a girl who had found her purpose.
My phone buzzed on the dresser. I picked it up.
Amanda: ONE WEEK UNTIL YOU'RE A COLLEGE GRAD! ARE YOU FREAKING OUT YET?
I smiled. Amanda and I had kept our promise.
She had moved to Nevada with the adoptive family. The couple turned out to be everything she had hoped for—kind, patient, loving. Her siblings thrived in their new school. Amanda had graduated high school with honors and gone on to college, studying to become a