Page 54 of 16 Forever

I go to Bodhi’s profile, and he’s got just one pic up in his stories, a selfie of him and Lizzy screaming into the camera lens.

I go to Lizzy’s story, and she’s got several photos up, along with a video of me being ridiculous. Seems I did the worm. And a bunch of other weird shit.

There’s a photo with Lizzy and Shana, so I go to Shana’s profile andJACKPOT: There’s a pic of her, Maggie, and this girl with a ridge of blue hair traversing the center of her head like a lawn-dividing shrub.

I stare at Maggie. She’s so pretty. Her smirking face sparks a memory.

She was laughing last night.

At something I said. Who knows what.

And also:

“We don’t have a history!”

She said that to me.

But I don’t think I believed her.

I find the name of one of my nine contacts and push on the camera icon next to his number.

“Well, hello there,” my younger-older brother says moments later, sitting in his tidy dorm room with his earbuds in.

“Howdy-ho,” I say.

“Still in bed, huh?” Lincoln asks.

“Well, yeah. But... I’m getting up in a second. Went to a party last night.”

“Ooh. How did that go?”

“It’s, uh, hard to say for sure. Fine, I think? I just watched a video of myself twerking.”

“Yikes.” Lincoln laughs. “Way to go, CT.”

“I know you’re making fun of me, but I’ll take it. What’re you up to?”

“Oh, you know. Pretending to get work done, watching TikTok instead. My roommate’s here too. This is Leo.” Lincoln flips the camera toward a white guy with glasses and shoulder-length hair parted down the middle, sitting on his twin bed and restringing an acoustic guitar.

“Hey,” Leo says, giving a barely perceptible nod.

“He’s very focused on his instrument,” Lincoln says, overly enunciating each word to be funny as he turns the camera back to himself.

“Fuck you,” Leo says off camera.

“So, look, I was wondering if you could tell me about Maggie Spear,” I say, cutting right to the point of my call.

“Sure, what about her?” Lincoln says without missing a beat, none of the awkward stammering I’ve gotten used to from Bodhi.

“Just, like... Did she and I ever hook up or anything?”

“Wait, Maggie Spear who goes to your school?” Lincoln looks convincingly confused in a way that instantly deflates the entire story I’ve constructed in my head. “Not that I’m aware of. Why do you think you hooked up with her?”

“Well, I don’t. I mean, maybe it wasn’t a hookup. But just— The first day I was back at school, on my birthday, I saw her sobbingin the hall as she looked at me. And then I showed up at this party her friend was throwing, and her friend didn’t want me there. She was trying to keep me and Maggie in separate rooms.”

“Huh,” Lincoln says, brushing curls away from his eyes. “You and Maggie definitely knew each other at school, I think. So I get why she’d be bummed to see you go through this. But I’m not sure you were super close or anything.”

“Okay,” I say.