Free Tangled Thoughts by Cara Bertrand

landed on my thigh, stilling its bouncing. As if she knew what I was thinking, Alexis said, “So, are you just going to work all weekend, or will we actually get to have some fun?” She was looking at her phone, not directly at me.
    â€œIt’s still my business too, babe.” When she’d said she wanted to come, I was all for it. But
Homecoming
meant something different to her than it did to me.
    â€œI know.” She dropped the pretense of the phone and leaned her face toward mine. “But it’s been running just fine without you for months now. This is a
getaway
, not a workaway.”
    â€œWe’ll see.”
    She groaned. “You’re impossible.” I had no defense for that. “You’re
at least
coming to the bonfire.”
    â€œWe’ll see.”
    T HE NEXT DAY , I ran close to ten miles. My feet didn’t want to stop and my lungs urged me to go farther because the
air
. The air tasted clear and smelled
right
. The way air should, like evergreen and freedom. If I ever made it to heaven, the air would be exactly like it was here.
    It felt so good to be on my home ground, but also, strange.
Everything
seemed larger or smaller or somehow
different
, but also exactly the same. Was this what everyone felt like when they left home and came back? It was all familiar yet vaguely unfamiliar at the same time. Now I compared home to another place in a way I’d never done before.
    Another thing I’d never done before was attend the Northbrook Homecoming bonfire. I always gave the store as an excuse—it was our busiest weekend of the year—but in truth I just hadn’t wanted to. Until last year, I
would
have come with Lainey, but we had dinner with Uncle Dan instead. So maybe I was glad it was something I’d never done. I only had memories of
not
being here with Lainey.
    From the shadows between two pine trees, I observed the party. The heat of the fire didn’t quite reach where I was hiding, but the air was slightly smoky and perfect. Sparks drifted toward the tall forest while voices competed with the crackling of the fire. Juniors, seniors, a few sophomores, and Academy faculty mingled with alumni. I scanned the crowd for the headmaster, but didn’t see her blade-like form anywhere. She saw me, though.
    â€œMr. Penrose.” I froze for half a second before I glanced over my shoulder toward the sound of her voice, but I wasn’t that surprised. I had just been looking for her.
    I nodded. “Headmaster.”
    She glided to a stop next to me, comfortable on the outskirts like I was. “I’m surprised to see you here.”
    â€œPleasantly?”
    Her thin smile made me proud. I could still get under her skin with a single word. “If memory serves,” she said, “this is the first bonfire you’ve attended.”
    I shrugged. “I wouldn’t say I’ve attended it yet.”
    â€œNo, I suppose you haven’t. You always were content just to loiter in the shadows.”
    I gritted my teeth and said nothing. Constance Stewart had been a near constant presence in my life, like a wicked aunt I didn’t choose and couldn’t get rid of. Lainey had liked her, though. She said I mis-understood her, but she was wrong. The headmaster and I understood each other
too
well.
    â€œAre you well?” she asked after she’d given her dig long enough to sink in.
    Carefully, I said, “I’m keeping busy,” because it was true. It was pointless to lie, even politely, to the Perceptum’s best
Vidi Veritas
—lie detector—in a generation.
    â€œI’m glad to hear it,” she said and I cut a look at her. It wasn’t a pleasantry; Dr. Stewart didn’t deal in them either. I felt off balance. I’d been gone too long to know what her game might be. I didn’t want to walk into a trap. Before I could decide what was safe to say next, she continued. “How do you find your