I didn't hate school. But when my mom dropped me off Monday morning, I wanted to fake sick.

What happened in that coat closet on Friday replayed in my head over and over again. I still didn't know who was in there with me. I didn't want to know.

That didn't stop Indy from trying to tell me all weekend. She texted me hints that, despite myself, I tried to decipher.

So far, the hints were:

He was cute

He looked good in a suit

He didn't normally smell like an abandoned onion factory

Those hints didn't help at all, but that didn't stop me from going through a mental catalog of Valle Vista boys. It also didn't keep me from checking the hand of every guy I passed as I walked across campus. Rings appeared to be very popular.

As promised, Indy came back up to her room to check on me that night. When she asked me why I ran and hid, I didn't have an answer for it. It was just...a lot. I was overwhelmed.

I didn't think I was the type to take a first kiss so seriously, but I was glad it didn't happen in a pitch black closet with someone I didn't know.

Indy bugged me for details about what happened that night. I kept my mouth shut. All of her guessing, thinking I had some hot and heavy make-out session in that closet, made me embarrassed to tell her that nothing happened.

My sister had so many stories and experience when it came boys. This was my first time having a story to share. Or, rather, a story she could speculate about. All I had to do was keep quiet.

Valle Vista High wasn't a large school. There were three main building at the front of the campus. Across the quad and outdoor lunch area, was the gym, locker rooms and swimming pool. There were trailers that housed even more classrooms near the student parking lot. That's where I headed.

My first class of the day took place in one of the trailers, but it was also where I hung out before the first bell.

As I made my way across the quad, passing the outdoor grill, I noticed a commotion in the breakfast line. The grill was only fired up during lunch. At the moment, two student cafeteria workers were serving those pre-packaged bowls of cereal and cartons of milk.

Andre Walker seemed to be the problem. He was easily recognizable from his hair. His curly high-top fade was dyed a honey blonde at the tips. He was also tall, with more muscle than you'd think was possible on a seventeen-year-old.

The football player and some of his friends appeared to be cutting the line. He was too busy on his phone to care that the emo kids he just pushed out of the way were glaring daggers at his back. And since the guy passing out breakfast was also one of Andre's friends, he didn't stop it.

The ego on some of the jocks at that school was astonishing. I rolled my eyes and kept walking.

My phone chimed with a notification. Without thinking, I opened it. There was another message from LaterTofu. I still hadn't read his other messages.

Or not

Forget I brought it up. Sorry

Are you still working on your butterfly?

The butterfly in question was something I was drawing, or trying to draw, for my mom. Mother's Day was months away and at the rate I was going, my surprise gift probably wouldn't be ready until then.

My mom loved butterflies. It was the theme of her bedroom. The little 3-D butterfly stickers that decorated her walls were a little too realistic for me and always made my skin crawl. But she liked them, so I tortured myself looking up butterfly references online. The insects were cute from a distance, but seeing their freaky little eyes up close gave me nightmares.

My plan was to create an illustration of a butterfly and have it printed on a shirt or a pillowcase for her. The drawing wasn't coming out how I wanted, though.

I almost told LaterTofu about my frustrations, but decided against it. There were too many other things to focus my mind on.

Like Romeo.

He had just looked up from his phone when he saw me. Meeting me halfway, he asked, "I'm I still annoying you?"

The things I did or said that night of Indy's party came back in pieces. Even though I was not drunk, my mind still had trouble putting things together. But I remembered calling Romeo annoying, and the broken look on his face before he left.

The lightness in his voice told me he wasn't being serious. Romeo was a pro at letting things roll off his back. He wasn't one to hold a grudge.

"You are," I said, looking up at him as I fought back a laugh. "But I'm sorry for saying it to your face."

"You call than an apology?"

I reached into my shoulder bag and pulled out a peace offering. "I have a Pop-Tart."

Romeo's eyes flicked from the silver foil wrapped snack to me. His mouth twitching. "Apology accepted."

He plucked the Pop-Tart from my hand and we went to sit in our usual spot. It was mid-January and freezing. That didn't deter us from sitting outside on a small curb in front of the chain-link fence that separated the area from the tennis courts. Most people opted for the indoor cafeteria on days that cold.

"Look, it's the traitors," Shania Cooper announced when she saw us. Her goddess locs hung loosely around her face as she peered up at us.

Next to her sat Keraun Hudson, who, unlike Nia, was happy to see us. He hopped up giving Romeo one of those bro hugs and me a regular hug.

Nia punched Keraun in the thigh. "We're supposed to be mad at them!"

"You're mad. I'm not," he stated, stealing the other half of Romeo's Pop-Tart just as he opened it. Romeo pouted the same way he did after Indy ate his last donut hole.

I sat next to Nia, giving her a side hug. She tried and failed to shrug me off. "What'd we do?"

Nia tapped her thumbs on her phone before a video popped up on the screen. It was of me and Romeo dancing. I full body cringed at myself. Was that how I danced? What the hell was I doing with my arms?

"You're mad at us for dancing?" Romeo asked, brows creased as his eyes were glued to the screen. He was sitting next to me and had to lean over me to see the video. Lavender and mint hit my nose.

The smell unlocked another memory from Friday. Me in Romeo's lap, telling him he smelled good. Yeah, I was never drinking again.

"Yes!" Nia shouted, grabbing my attention. "Daya doesn't dance in public. Yet, she's dancing here. Which means Daya got drunk and we weren't alerted."

"Just so we're clear," Keraun chimed in from the other side of Nia, pushing his glasses up his nose. "I'm just happy you were having fun."

I smiled at him in thanks.

"No, you're mad." Nia put her hand on his face and pushed him back. "We're mad."

"Also, I wasn't drunk," I said, but looking at that video...maybe I was just a tiny bit.

"Why weren't we invited to this party?" She demanded, throwing her locs over her shoulder.

"You were," I told her. "You said you weren't interested. And Keraun had a date with Jason. How'd that go, by the way?"

Keraun met Jason over winter break on HALLZ, but Friday was the first time they actually hung out in person. Jason used to go to our school last year, but transferred to a private school this year.

"It went--"

"No! Stop being friendly," Nia said. All I could do was laugh at her and hug her tighter. She tried to push me off, but eventually gave up.

"I'll tell you when the brat leaves," he said and Nia smacked his chest. She was very violent for six in the morning.

She turned to glare at me. "And if I knew the biggest square in our group was getting drunk and playing Seven Minutes in Heaven with--"

I slapped a hand over her mouth. "Don't. I don't want to know who it was!"

Her brown eyes doubled in size. "You don't know who you were in the closet with?" she said after I moved my hand from her mouth. She looked at Romeo. "You didn't tell her?"

He shrugged, staring intensely at his hot fudge sundae Pop-Tart. "I left before all that happened."

He left after I told him he annoyed me? A Pop-Tart was definitely a weak apology.

Nia was a mix of excitement and astonishment. Her eyes were wide and her mouth formed the perfect "O" shape. She was giddy like a kid in a candy story. She shook me by the shoulders. "You really don't want to know who it was?"

"No, I don't." But her reaction made me the tiniest bit curious. "Now chill out before you pass out."

I'd witnessed her faint from excitement once and didn't want a repeat. I didn't want to know how she'd react to her marriage proposal or if she ever won the lottery.

"Hold on." Keraun leaned forward to get a better look at me. "You were in a closet with the guy for seven minutes and you didn't get his name? What were you doing?"

Nia put her elbows on her knees and cradled her chin in her hands, her eyes sparkling for gossip. "Yes, Daya, what were you doing?"

I shot up to my feet, thankful for my math teacher coming around the corner at that exact moment. She was balancing a giant binder, coffee, and a box of donuts. She always brought donuts on Mondays.

"Good morning, Mrs. Ahmadi!"

A smile spread across her face as she used her keys to unlock the classroom. "Good morning, Daya. And co," she said, noticing the other three behind me.

"Do you need help carrying that?" She graciously accepted, handing me her load so she could get the door opened.

"Teacher's pet!" Keraun said in a stage whisper as I followed the teacher into the classroom.

"This conversation isn't over, Hartley!" Nia promised.

Romeo sat there and ate his Pop-Tart. He'd been weirdly quiet. Maybe he was still upset about what I said to him the other night. Whatever it was, I needed to fix it.

"Mother, I'm home!" I kicked my shoes off at the door and tossed my backpack on the couch as I passed it.

My mom didn't reply, but I heard the vacuum cleaner. I followed the sound down the hall to my room, where she was pushing the vacuum across the ugly burgundy carpet. She had wireless headphones in, probably listening to a YouTuber's recap of one of the many reality shows she watched.

Her phone was on my dresser and I hit pause on the video. She stopped cleaning, mumbling about her headphones dying without warning, before she looked up and saw me.

"Hey, I didn't hear you come in." She removed her headphones, securing them in a case that had a bedazzled blue butterfly on the front.

A headband kept her shoulder length twists out of her face. The slouchy Raider's hoodie she loved so much was pushed up her forearms.

I walked further into my room, slipping on some house shoes. They were pink and furry, given to me by Indy for Christmas. She got herself a matching pair in black.

"You cleaned my room?" The pajamas I'd thrown on the floor that morning weren't there anymore. My perfumes and lotions were neatly lined up on the dresser. The dust that normally sat on the window ledge was gone.

She looked around the room as if she hadn't noticed it herself. Scratching the back of her head, she shrugged. "Yeah. I was testing out a new product. After I picked up the clothes from the floor, I might've gone overboard.""

That's when I realized she wasn't using our normal vacuum. My mom worked as a birthing coach by day and blogger at night. Companies sent her things for free to test out and review for her 17.4K followers.

It was a hobby she picked up last year after my uncle put the idea in her head. My mom loved trying new products and foods and traveling. Even before she got paid to do it. Now she was able to do it, mostly, for free.

"I love this thing, though," she continued. She pushed the vacuum around the room, geeking out over how smooth the turns were and how the compact sized made it easy to get under furniture and in corners. Only my mom would talk about a vacuum cleaner with the enthusiasm of someone meeting their favorite celebrity.

She snapped a few pictures of the dust free corners of my room before leaving to clean other parts of the house with her new toy.

I changed out of my jeans into so some workout leggings that had never experienced a workout. When I was heading back to the living room to watch TV and do my homework, my phone chimed.

Again, I opened the HALLZ notification on instinct.

You're still reading my messages and you haven't blocked me

So I'll take that as a good sign?

Would it help if I told you I was Andre Walker?

I nearly tripping over the cord of my mom's vacuum cleaner. LaterTofu was Andre Walker? No. That had to be a lie. Of course, it was a lie. Someone had just pretended to be him to get money. This person was not conning me.

I'd been talking to LaterTofu for almost a month. Ever since my mom surprised me with an iPad for Christmas, after I made a vague statement about wanting one for digital art. When I got the device I realized drawing on it was a lot harder than using pencil and paper. So, I sought out help. LaterTofu was the only person to respond. He'd been helping me ever since.

It didn't seem likely that he'd start lying about who he was. Yet, it felt even more unlikely that'd I'd been talking to Andre Walker all that time.

Dropping myself down on the couch, I made up my mind. He was lying. It was the only thing that made sense.

You expect me to believe that?

Three days after some girl was scammed out of money by "Andre Walker"??

Even if you were him

(which you're not)

I'm not interested in big headed jocks who think the sun rises and sets just for them

I watched the text chain, waiting for a reply, a defense on his part. LaterTofu read my message. It was a long time before I realized he wasn't going to reply. Then he went offline.

Some part of me wanted to take back what I said. He did help me with my art the last few weeks. But I also couldn't tolerate a lie like that big. If it even was a lie.

Before I could fall down the rabbit hole of doubt, Indy's face popped up on my screen. I accepted the video chat.

Indy was in AP classes and we didn't have the same lunch block, so I rarely saw her at school. So, she had lots of drama to catch me up on. I settled into the couch, thankful for the distraction from LaterTofu.