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Holden Caulfield: A whiny, unlikable narrator. Insults those he calls “phonies,” but he’s really just one himself.—KB

I laughed softly and scrawled out my own note.

Holden Caulfield: A boy who feels alienated from society, is struggling to understand his place in the world, and is looking for someone he can relate to. A story about loneliness.—TF

Always the optimist, Tenleigh Falyn, even when it comes to unlikable characters.—KB

I smiled at his note. I’d never thought of myself as an optimist, but maybe I was. And maybe we all reacted to stories differently based on our own hearts.

In February, the top four students were announced, the students who were in the running for the Tyton Coal Scholarship. It was down to me, Kyland, and two other girls. I received my letter of admission from San Diego State University and I accepted. It seemed like a cruelty to accept something I may never get the chance to use, but if I won the scholarship, I had to have a school to apply it to. If I didn’t win, I’d rescind my acceptance, as would the other two students. I didn’t ask Kyland where he’d accepted. I didn’t want to know.

All that winter and into early spring, we studied together, we kissed long and slow anywhere and everywhere, we hiked through the hills, and we showed each other the secret spots we loved deep in the Appalachian Mountains, where there was only beauty and only peace. We sat by streams and fished with Kyland’s homemade fishing pole, my head on his lap, the sunshine warming our skin, the tall grass whispering in the breeze. We walked through meadows sprinkled with wildflowers and I collected them and put bouquets in old tin cans in my trailer and on Kyland’s windowsill. We spent glorious nights exploring each other’s bodies, learning every spot that brought pleasure. We read book after book, only discussing them through very short written notes that somehow gave a brief insight into the heart of the other.

I worked when I got the shifts. I struggled, I went hungry some nights, and I scraped together pennies to pay for Mama’s medicine.

And I fell in love.

Deep, hard, utter, and complete love.

And he was still leaving. And he still wouldn’t look back.

Maybe I’d be leaving too. Anxiety and worry moved through my body whenever I considered it. It wasn’t only the confusion of the scholarship and how it would impact Kyland if I won it; it was also the thought of leaving my home. I’d dreamed of going to college for so long and, suddenly, leaving my mama, leaving Marlo, leaving everything I knew and…yes, loved—for I did love Dennville, Kentucky, despite the fact that misery lived here too—suddenly, all of it filled me with fear and panic.

Maybe it also had to do with the fact that my mama was doing so much better since she’d been on the new medications. She’d been getting out of bed on her own every day and showering. She’d even started taking walks. She seemed almost normal, and I had never ever used that word to describe my mama. She was better, and she was worse, but she’d never been normal. It was like Marlo and I were getting a second chance with her. But what would happen when I was no longer here? We were barely scraping together the money it took to buy her prescriptions as it was. When I left, there’d be that much less of an income, as small as it was. Of course, they wouldn’t have to feed me anymore either.

But when I thought about not winning it, my heart plummeted to my feet. What would I do then? Would I work full-time at Al’s like Marlo did? What other choice did I have? There were no jobs here that paid more than minimum wage, and unlike Kyland, I didn’t have the courage to start hitchhiking across the country with little more than a knapsack on my back. Plus, I had people here tying me to Dennville. Kyland didn’t have anyone…well, anyone except me. And despite the fact that we’d gotten very close, he couldn’t stay for me. And I wouldn’t ask him to.

Sometimes I caught him looking at me with this strange expression on his face—a mixture of pain and decisiveness. I wasn’t sure what it meant, but it made me feel jittery and nervous.

Could I handle getting even closer to Kyland only to have him leave and never look back? Could I handle loving him more deeply? Or could he…would he change his mind about cutting all ties now that our relationship had deepened to…well, to more than it had been?

“Stupid Tenleigh,” I muttered. I’d gotten myself in this situation despite the fact that Kyland had done everything in his power to warn me away. But I couldn’t regret it. I couldn’t. I loved him. He was a part of my heart and I hoped desperately that I had become enough of a part of his that it’d be impossible for him to simply leave me behind.