Free First There Was Forever by Juliana Romano Page B

still, like, nags me about cleaning my room.”
    Her eyes suddenly focused on me. “How are you? I haven’t seen you in forever, and I seriously miss you.”
    I wanted to say that she hadn’t seen me because she had been avoiding me, but all that came out was, “I’m okay.” I had the sensation that everything that had been on my mind for the last few weeks about the problems with our friendship was being erased by Hailey right that second.
    “What are you doing for Thanksgiving?” she asked. “I love Thanksgiving with your family, and my mom doesn’t want to do a whole thing this year. Can I tag along with you?”
    I hesitated, looking at the people still filing on to the bus.
    “It’s okay,” Hailey said. “I don’t know why I’m inviting myself; that’s rude.”
    “No,” I said quickly, “of course you can come. We’re having it at our house. My mom already asked me if you were coming.”
    Nate appeared on the bus behind a girl with a yellow backpack.
    “I love
your mom,” Hailey said, not smiling. “Let’s make something really awesome and fattening like pumpkin pie. I’m fucking tired of yogurt.”
    The flow of traffic down the aisle of the bus had come to a halt with Nate standing right next to the seat that Hailey and I were in. He stared straight ahead, either not seeing us or pretending not to. His hand rested on the cracking leather of the seat in front of Hailey’s face. I stared at his hands. His fingertips were chapped.
    Hailey followed my gaze and realized that Nate was standing right next to her. She brightened immediately and flicked his thigh.
    He looked at her, not smiling.
    “Nate Reed. In the flesh,” she said drily.
    He took a deep breath.
    “You never talk to me anymore, Nate,” she said, beaming up at him. “Do you even know my name?”
    “Hailey,” he replied, and then put his hand on the shoulder of the yellow backpack girl. “Go.”
    “I love it when he says my name!” Hailey whispered to me, smiling from ear to ear. “How is he so hot?!”
    I frowned.
    “Do you think he could tell I was crying, like, two minutes ago?” she asked.
    I certainly couldn’t.
    “It’s okay if he can,” she said. “Maybe it’s even good. I mean, maybe it’ll make him wonder about me.”
    I craned my neck up and backward over the sea of heads. Nate was still standing, waiting to sit in the back of the bus, his backpack draped languidly over his right shoulder. Somehow I just didn’t really think he was wondering anything whatsoever about Hailey.

chapter

twenty-four

    “W hy aren’t you guys doing Thanksgiving in Santa Barbara this year?” Hailey asked, dipping a piece of turkey in her cranberry sauce and taking a bite.
    “I’m in the middle of a big case,” Dad said, and he and Mom exchanged a look.
    “I told him to let himself off the hook and stay here and rest,” Mom said, beaming at Dad.
    “Nana’s gonna miss you, Jim!” Hailey said, wagging her fork at Dad in mock disapproval.
    Dad chuckled a little.
    “Are you not eating your marshmallows?” Hailey asked, glancing at my plate.
    I had eaten the sweet potato bottom out of my casserole, leaving a glistening pile of burned white marshmallow on my plate. “It’s too sweet for me.”
    “I hate you,” Hailey said affectionately, reaching over and scooping up the marshmallows with her fork.
    Mom and Dad laughed.
    “I guess that’s what friends are for,” Mom said, a teasing gleam in her eye. “To hate each other.”
    Dad laughed.
    I could tell they were happy to see Hailey back in my life.
    • • •
    After dinner, Hailey and I watched an eighties movie on my laptop, lying side by side on my bed. It felt like old times, the way our bodies just intertwined with each other, as if the other person was neutral space, or an extension of ourselves.
    “I’m not tired,” Hailey said in that strange, hollow quiet that comes right after you turn off the TV or end a movie.
    “Me neither,” I said.
    We put on