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Mr. Riley tries again. “We’re all a little more excited about homecoming, thank you, Sara.”

Nothing but quiet and awkward expressions, and then, out of nowhere, Sara says, “Go Marauders!”

I blink three times. This is happening. Sara’s shoulders are straight, her chin is lifted, her practice-perfect smile shows off her braces. She’s not even fazed by the stunned stares directed at her.

“Okay.” Mr. Riley rubs his hands together and puts on his best rally-the-troops face. “Maybe we should have some snacks before we discuss ideas for our next monthly LGBTQ book. Kenny! You have a great one for us, right?”

Kenny, all blue-green hair and light-brown eyes, nods happily. Kenny, our resident bibliophile, has wildly unoriginal taste. I’m betting it’s another David Levithan book.

Students shuffle to the donuts. The homecoming committee exits. Briefly, Sara hangs in the doorway. Her perfectly composed expression has faded into something gray and blank.

Do you want to stay?hangs on my tonsils. I never ask. She looks relieved. We exchange uncertain stares before she leaves.

8

“How much do you thinkhired assassins cost?”

Lucy lifts a flawlessly-plucked eyebrow at me. I don’t blink.

Yes, this is the conversation two best friends have on an ordinary Thursday, after school. We’re in my car. I’m supposed to give her a ride home, but I’m stalling. She hasn’t complained.

Lucy hums. “Are we talking ex-CIA? MI6? Rogue FBI operatives?”

“All of the above.”

“Why?”

I slouch in my seat. “I’m confident Sara hates me. Just curious if she can afford to have me murdered.”

“And you think it’d take trained assassins to do that?”

“Hell yeah!” I try, and fail, to flex a bicep. I’m pathetically toneless in the muscles department. Gym class is an unacceptable block of sweating and being awkward because I can’t catch a ball. I get more exercise trying not to be tardy to homeroom every morning.

I’m still reeling from Sara’s appearance at the GSA meeting. Our friendship is such a mystery. There are days when we laugh at the same jokes, share wide-eyed looks at something epically outrageous one of the Liu twins has said, smile knowingly at Lucy’s anime rambling. I remember one lunch break that we spent dissecting Darcy’s wardrobe choices.

But there’s also a thin wall separating us, one created by some unknown force. Maybe it’s because I’ve raised my eyebrows more than once at the way she looks at Lucy. Maybe it’s because I’m out to everyone. Or maybe it’s because, no matter how close people think they are to each other, there are always things unsaid, always vulnerabilities we don’t feel safe enough to share. But I wish Iknewher the way I did Lucy, or Brook, or even Alex and Zac.

“Andrew’s annual Halloween party is coming up,” says Lucy, as if the last minute never existed. I can’t blame her.

I don’t say anything about her scuffed-up crimson Converse on my dashboard. My dad gave me his old, midnight-blue Toyota Corolla for my sixteenth birthday. It doesn’t even have Bluetooth; just an auxiliary port to plug my phone into. POP ETC is softly playing, a catchy tune that’s all claps and acoustics. Lucy’s shoes wiggle back and forth to it.

“You’re going, right.” It’s not a question.

“Nope,” I tell her.

“Why not?”

“Trick-or-treating with Willow.” I pop a mini-Reese’s peanut butter cup in my mouth, savoring the slow melting of chocolate before the healing burst of peanut butter hits my taste buds. “It’s tradition.”

“I forgot.” Lucy sighs.

I reach under her legs for the glovebox to pluck another Reese’s from a wrinkled bag.

“You could always come afterward.”

“Maybe.”

“Maybe?”