“At Starbucks,” he answered. “She was in line in front of me.”
“Oh,” Spencer said. How incredibly lame.
“She was buying a latte,” Wren added, kicking at the stone curb.
“That’s nice.” Spencer fiddled with her pack of cigarettes.
“This was a few months ago.” He raggedly took another drag, his hand shaking a little and his eyes darting around. “I fancied her before she got the town house.”
“Right,” Spencer said, realizing he seemed a little nervous. Maybe he was tense about meeting her parents. Or was it moving in with Melissa that had him on edge? If Spencer were a boy and had to move in with Melissa, she’d throw herself off Moshulu’s crow’s nest into the Delaware River.
He handed the cigarette back to her. “I hope it’s okay that I’m going to be staying in your house.”
“Um, yeah. Whatever.”
Wren licked his lips. “Maybe I can get you to kick your smoking addiction.”
Spencer stiffened. “I’m not addicted.”
“Sure you’re not,” Wren answered, smiling.
Spencer shook her head emphatically. “No, I’d never let that happen.” And it was true: Spencer hated feeling out of control.
Wren smiled. “Well, you certainly sound like you know what you’re doing.”
“I do.”
“Are you that way with everything?” Wren asked, his eyes shining.
There was something about the light, teasing way he said it that made Spencer pause. Were they…flirting? They stared at each other for a few seconds until a big group of people came whooshing off the boat onto the street. Spencer lowered her eyes.
“So, do you think it’s time we go back?” Wren asked.
Spencer hesitated and looked at the street, full of taxis, ready to take her wherever she wanted. She almost wanted to ask Wren to get in one of the cabs with her and go to a baseball game at Citizens Bank Park, where they could eat hot dogs, yell at the players, and count how many strikeouts the Phillies’ starting pitcher racked up. She could use her dad’s box seats—they mostly just went to waste, anyway—and she bet Wren would be into that. Why go back in, when her family was just going to continue to ignore them? A cab paused at the light, just a few feet from them. She looked at it, then back at Wren.
But no, that’d be wrong. And who would fill the vice president’s post if he died and she was murdered by her own sister? “After you,” Spencer said, and held the door open for him so they could climb back aboard.
5
STARTS AND FITZ
“Hey! Finland!”
On Tuesday, the first day of school, Aria walked quickly to her first-period English class. She turned to see Noel Kahn, in his Rosewood Day sweater vest and tie, jogging toward her. “Hey.” Aria nodded. She kept going.
“You bolted from our practice the other day,” Noel said, sidling up next to her.
“You expected me to watch?” Aria looked at him out of the corner of her eye. He looked flushed.
“Yeah. We scrimmaged. I scored three goals.”
“Good for you,” Aria deadpanned. Was she supposed to be impressed?
She continued down the Rosewood Day hallway, which she’d unfortunately dreamed about way too many times in Iceland. Above her were the same eggshell-white, vaulted ceilings. Below her were the same farmhouse-cozy wood floors. To her right and left were the usual framed photos of stuffy alums, and to her left, incongruous rows of dented metal lockers. Even the very same song, the 1812 Overture, hummed through the PA speakers—Rosewood played between-classes music because it was “mentally stimulating.” Sweeping by her were the exact same people Aria had known for a gazillion years…and all of them were staring.
Aria ducked her head. Since she’d moved to Iceland at the beginning of eighth grade, the last time everyone had seen her she was part of the grief-stricken group of girls whose best friend freakishly vanished. Back then, wherever she went, people were whispering about her.
Now, it felt like she’d never left. And it almost felt like Ali was still here. Aria’s breath caught in her chest when she saw a flash of blond ponytail swishing around the corner to the gym. And when Aria rounded the corner past the pottery studio, where she and Ali used to meet between classes to trade gossip, she could almost hear Ali yelling, “Hey, wait up!” She pressed her hand to her forehead to see if she had a fever.
“So what class do you have first?” Noel asked, still keeping pace with her.
She looked at him, surprised, and then down at her schedule. “English.”
“Me too. Mr. Fitz?”
“Yeah,” she mumbled. “He any good?”
“Dunno. He’s new. Heard he was a Fulbright Scholar, though.”
Aria eyed him suspiciously. Since when did Noel Kahn care about a teacher’s credentials? She turned around a corner and saw a girl standing in the English room doorway. She looked familiar and foreign all at the same time. This girl was model-thin, had long, red-brown hair, and wore a rolled-up blue plaid Rosewood uniform skirt, purple platform wedge-heels, and a Tiffany charm bracelet.
Aria’s heart started to pound. She’d worried about how she might react when she saw her old friends again, and here was Hanna. What had happened to Hanna?
“Hey,” Aria said softly.
Hanna turned and looked Aria up and down, from her long, shaggy haircut to her Rosewood Day white shirt and chunky Bakelite bracelets to her brown scuffed lace-up boots. A blank expression crossed her face, but then she smiled.