Page 34 of (My Accidental) Killer Summer

“You’re fine. This is fine. Totally chill.” I repeat under my breath. Like a mantra.

Amy hands me the to-go coffee she prepped before we left. I take a long sip and inhale deeply. That’s not coffee I’m smelling.

I sniff again.

Ohmigod! Is that . . .

Sniff.

I swear I smell a faint whiff of decomposing contractor wafting through the A/C vents.

“Amy, do you smell that?” I ask as loudly as I dare while keeping it from the kids.

“I don’t think so,” she says.

Jesus, Elle, get it together.

My hands are shaking. My heart is racing.

I’m going to blame the Adderall I stole from Jaq’s daily allotment for their ADD. Which I took with a full cup of coffee on an empty stomach followed by a coffee chaser.

“We’re not going to be late, right?” Jaq’s voice cuts through my caffeine-induced panic, pulling me back to the present.

“I told Sophie I would walk in with her and she’s like, weirdly punctual ever since she got Invisalign,” they say.

Ah, yes. Sophie.

The girl Jaq is hanging out with. Not dating, just hanging. And, while she seems like a nice enough girl, I don’t know her or her parents well. I’d like to think they practice tolerance and believe in equality, but it’s so hard to know.

“We’re going to be right on time,” I say with confidence I don’t possess.

Amy raises an eyebrow and looks at me in question.

I give her a look that hopefully says, ‘I’ll tell you later.’ She goes back to whatever she’s doing on her phone.

I glance in the rearview mirror at my twins, Jaq, a mix of impatience and concern, and Jill, the picture of calm serenity without a care in the world. It’s so easy to tell them apart now that they’ve leaned into establishing their own style and sense of self. Jillian and Jaqueline Grant may have been born identical twins, but the similarities tapered off long ago.

Jill is a wide-eyed innocent girly girl with long wavy blonde hair; she reminds me of when I was her age. Jaq is an old soul and already seems way too mature for their age, like they’ve seen too much of life and are scarred by their experiences.

Granted, I have no idea what it’s like to feel as though you don’t belong in your own body. It’s hard enough being a teenager, without throwing the question of gender identity into it. I don’t trust that the world won’t always be trying to push Jaq into one slot or the other, as if there are only two.

What I wouldn’t give to keep them in my pocket shielded from the cruelties of a society that seems to be regressing in terms of tolerance. I swipe at my watering eyes and focus on navigating the familiar streets of Santa Luna. The morning sun is bright, casting a golden hue over everything, making it feel almost normal. So, I take another sip of my coffee, feeling the hot liquid slide down my throat, a temporary reprieve from the chaos swirling in my mind and pretend that everything is normal.

“Did you both finish your homework?” I ask, glancing back at them, also intent on their respective phones.

“Yep!” Jill chirps.

There was never any doubt.

“Of course,” Jaq replies, a little too quickly. “I mean, mostly.”

That’s what I was afraid of. School does not come as easily to Jaq as it does to Jill. Which often feeds into the innate competitiveness that blooms between siblings.

“Mostly?” I echo, raising an eyebrow. “What does ‘mostly’ mean?” I’m pretty sure I already know what it means, but I wait to see what they’ll say anyway.

“It means I did all the math problems but forgot to write the essay,” Jaq admits sheepishly.

“Great,” I mutter under my breath, already feeling the weight of another potential disaster looming over me. “You know you can’t just wing it on essays, right?”