Page 73 of Room to Breathe

“This has nothing to do with that,” he said. “It has to do with all the terrible choices you’re making lately. Ditching your friends, dating some criminal, cheating on tests. You need help.”

“You’re not in charge of me!”

“Someone needs to be.”

Where before the rage had been red like fire, now it felt white-hot. “I didn’t tattle onyoufor cheating!”

“I’ve never cheated,” he said.

And that’s when I said something I shouldn’t have. Something I knew wasn’t a completely accurate representation of events but something my anger spewed out of my mouth anyway. “So you don’t consider kissing Lucy at Harper’s birthday party cheating?”

Harper gasped from beside him.

Beau’s eyes went dark. “You know that’s not what happened.”

“I thought you told hereverything. You obviously didn’t tell her this.” That much was apparent by the utter surprise on Harper’s face.

“Indy,” Caroline said in a voice laced with disappointment. “This isn’t cool.”

“Yeah, well, I’ve never been cool.”

I knew I’d screwed everything up, done this all wrong. I was livid, yes, but this wasn’t how this should’ve gone down. I should’ve talked to Beau calmly, alone, asked him why he did it. Because sure, I shouldn’t have broken into the school and I shouldn’t have cheated. I knew that. But we were friends. We were just getting Cody’s backpack. And it was six questions. Shouldn’t he have talked to me, asked me what was going on with me, before turning me in? My life had turned upside down and sideways. I would’ve told him that. Then I would’ve told him that we went in through an open window. And as for the test, he could’ve made me redo those questions for him at his kitchen table to prove I knew the concepts, because I did. But instead he’d taken this to the principal? Screwed up not just my now, but potentially my future, my college options,everything. All because he couldn’t stand that I beat him in the class rankings? Or maybe it was because everything had to be perfect in his brain. Things were either black or white. There was no gray.

“Walk away, Indy,” Ava said. “You basically already have.”

Tears sprang to my eyes and I whirled on her. “I will,” I said. “Because you have all been terrible friends. You have no idea what’s going on in my life because you haven’t cared enough to find out.”

“Maybe you should’ve trusted us enough to tell us,” Ava said.

Maybe I should’ve, but I had sworn to my mom I wouldn’t. And it was far too late now. I gripped the straps on my backpack and met each of their eyes in turn. Caroline looked like she wanted to say something. Even opened her mouth to do it, but then she averted her gaze.

I walked away.

I was well out of sight when my phone buzzed in my pocket. For one hopeful moment I thought that someone from the group I’d just left behind had texted me. That the message would ask me to come back or meet them somewhere and explain things when we didn’t have an audience. But when I pulled out my phone, it was a text from Cody:

Where are you?

Sitting in my car. I’m not feeling well.

I wasn’t sitting in my car yet, but that’s where I was heading. I could see it across the parking lot, my safe space.

I unlocked the doors and crawled into the back seat. I could’ve driven away from here, but I wasn’t sure where to go. Home didn’t seem any better than here, not with at least one disappointed parent waiting for me there. Ready to tell me how wrong I’d been. I was sure my mom had told my dad. Probably even rubbed it in his face in a “look what you created” kind of way. And she was right. This all did stem from my dad’s situation.

There was a knock on my window and I looked over to seeCody’s face smashed against the glass. He pointed at the door and I nodded. He opened it and I sat up to make room for him.

“What’s going on?” he asked. “You sick?”

“Kind of.”

“Bummer,” he said, climbing in next to me and pulling me into a hug. He smelled a bit smoky, probably because his grandma smoked in the house. But the human connection, the feel of his hands pressed against my back and my cheek pressed against the skin on his neck, brought me some comfort.

“Yeah,” I agreed. Because it was.

He didn’t ask for any more information, and maybe I was glad about that. He just said, “You want me to drive you to get some McDonald’s?”

“You have a car?” I asked.

“No, I’d drive yours.”