Free Love Letters to the Dead by Ava Dellaira Page B

with Evan Friedman. Remember? Anyway, Kasey’s going to take me. I talked him into it. He’s borrowing his dad’s convertible. But I guess you can come with us if you want.”
    Natalie looked annoyed. “Why would he want to go to a high school dance? He’s, like, nineteen.”
    Hannah gave a sly smile and said, “I told him if he came, afterward I’d give him an extra good surprise.”
    I could see then that something in Natalie got crushed. The look on her face was like when you just finished making a waffle in the morning, and you got it out of the toaster, and you put on the butter and the syrup and had it cut along the lines into square inches, and you were carrying it into your room, so excited, but then you dropped it facedown on the floor. And you felt so sad about the whole thing, you didn’t even want to make another.
    Natalie just said, “Okay, that’s cool. Actually, someone asked me, anyway.”
    Hannah looked at her and said, “Who?”
    Natalie looked down at the floor, and then back up at Hannah. Her cheeks were red. If she was angry or embarrassed, I don’t know. But it was their moment. So I mumbled something about Nutter Butters and went away.
    As I was going up to get in the lunch line, I saw Sky standing there. I started to walk the other way. But I turned back and stood in line behind him. I stared at the back of his head and didn’t say anything for a while. I kept opening my mouth, but nothing came out. Finally, I said, “Hey.”
    He turned around, surprised to see me. “Oh. Hi.”
    “Hey,” I said again, stupidly.
    “What’s up?”
    I was trying to think of how to answer that question again, such a terrible question. Instead I said, “So, are you going to the dance this weekend?”
    “I don’t know. Are you?”
    “Going to the dance?”
    He looked at me like, Yes, obviously .
    “I don’t know, either.” Then I said, “Well, yeah, I guess I am. Someone asked me.”
    Sky tensed up, I swear the muscles in his arm got the teensiest bit harder, and he said, “Who?”
    “Just this guy.” It was too quiet. So I continued. “But I don’t even know if I want to go anyway. I mean, it’s like that kind of thing that’s never what it’s supposed to be, you know?”
    Suddenly, out of nowhere, Sky said, “Your sister was May, huh?”
    I felt frozen. How did he know that? No one here has asked me about May, except Mrs. Buster. Maybe Sky had friends who went to May’s old school. He’s a junior, the same age as her. Or maybe he went there before he transferred. It wouldn’t be impossible.
    “Yeah,” I finally replied.
    “You look like her.”
    “Really?” I felt like someone was waving sparklers inside my chest. I could feel hot stars jumping off of them. He thought I looked like her.
    I never want to talk about May with any of my friends. But now, with Sky, it felt good almost, like he was part of her secret world. And he didn’t ask any questions he shouldn’t. He just said, “Yeah. You have her eyes.”
    Then we were quiet again, until he said, “I don’t know if I’ll show up.”
    “At the dance?”
    “Yeah.”
    “You should.”
    “Why?”
    “Just ’cause. What if it does actually turn out like it’s supposed to? You know, like Christmas when you were little and it didn’t make you sad.”
    Sky laughed a little and said, “You think a lot about that, don’t you? How it’s supposed to be.”
    Before I could answer, Sky was at the front of the line. He ordered his pizza, which came in a tinfoil triangle. When it was my turn, Sky looked like he didn’t know if he should wait for me or carry his shiny pizza away. I looked at him as the lunch lady tapped her fingers impatiently on the counter. I was holding up the line. I knew there was something to say. But he just smiled, a smile that seemed to understand, before he walked away.
    Yours,
Laurel

    Dear Kurt,
    The night of the dance, I ate cold potato pancakes with Dad. That sounds sort of depressing, but I