Free Vengeance by Megan Miranda

is,” she said, and her lips brushed mine. She hated knowing. I didn’t realize how much until that moment. But then she was kissing me,and I was thinking of only that, and then Boston, and then her and Boston, and the future stretching out before me, like the vision in her head transferred to my own until I wanted it as much as I wanted to close the door to her bedroom.
    I had filled out that form and asked my dad for a check the second I’d walked into my house.
    Boston was Delaney’s dream, and I wasn’t sure if I had one separate from hers. But Kevin and Justin were going, and we got excused from classes, so I was going.
    “You overpacked,” Maya said, almost like she was trying to be cute—it was something she would say to Kevin, tossing her hair over her shoulder, leaning into him. But with me, she didn’t move. Didn’t smile. Didn’t blink. So unlike the girl who hugged me in the parking lot.
    “Don’t you have somewhere to be? Kevin’s, maybe?”
    “You’re being a dick,” she said.
    I stared at her. “Yeah, you don’t get to talk to me like that.”
    Before she got together with Kevin, Maya was always around. It drove me crazy through the summer, when all I wanted was time alone with Delaney. But her mom was basically in some sort of hospice care, and her brother bounced back and forth between college and home. Delaney said it seemed like she just needed to get out of the house, so I was a jerk if I said anything. Honestly, I was thrilled when she hooked up with Kevin, because she hung out here a lot less.
    She narrowed her eyes, scanned me slowly. “I don’t get what she sees, anyway,” she said. She shrugged, turned to go.
    “Get off my porch,” I said, even though she was already on her way.
    “Oh, poor Decker,” she said. She strode over to me, and I was completely taken aback. I’d never seen this side of her. She stood too close, way too close, and tilted her head to the side, like she was lining up to kiss me. “Your dad dies and that gives you free reign to be a complete ass?” Her breath smelled like cinnamon gum. She put her hand on my chin—I looked past her, wondering if anyone else was seeing this. “Grow up,” she said. Then she wandered back to Delaney’s.

Chapter 5
    I drove up the winding road cut into the side of the mountain overlooking Falcon Lake. The only place you’d find enormous homes and fancy cars. The place you’d find Kevin’s house. His family had money for generations and generations, and half the original establishments carried his last name. All the money in the world, and he was still here with the rest of us.
    I pulled into his circular driveway, but he was walking down the front steps. “Hey, Deck,” he said, “you coming with?”
    My master plan was to stay here, bum a meal off him so I wouldn’t have to sit around the dinner table with Delaney and Maya.
    Kevin continued, “I’m supposed to be in the dunk tank in thirty minutes.”
    “For what?” The dunk tank was exactly what it sounded like—a plastic box that our school owned. Every group or club used it for fund-raisers. Kevin wasn’t in any clubs.
    He looked at me like I was a moron. “That PTA barbecue. Favor to my mom.”
    His mom was the head of the PTA. His mom was the head of everything. His family practically owned this town. This was another thing that happened every year, one of those things I could keep time with. Labor Day equals free pizza and fortunes and Justin’s lake house. First day of school equals PTA barbecue— not vandalizing school property and scouring what used to be my home for clothes.
    Kevin was in jeans. Nice sneakers. A collared shirt that the rest of us would’ve looked ridiculous in. “Bathing suit?” I asked.
    “No way. Then I’ll have no excuse to leave. Come on. Free food.”
    Which was, after all, what I came for.
    Half the school was here. There were grills set up in stations around the parking lot, and there were raffles, and, of course,