When the alarm on my phone chirps, I open my eyes to find Mom looming over my bed. I squeal, which startles her enough that she also squeals, and then it takes me a minute to sit up and rub the sleep from my eyes before I can figure out what’s going on. Mom—already dressed to teach—is holding a plate of pancakes. They’re adorned with fresh strawberries in the shape of the number seventeen, and there’s a lit candle in the center.
“Thanks.” I blow out the candle. “What are the chances you made coffee, too?”
“Pretty good,” says Mom, and she hugs me.
“Wait, what?” says Oliver as he pulls out of my driveway. “How are you not eighteen?”
“You know I have to explain this to someone at least once a year, right?”
“Enlighten me.”
“When Dad left for New York and Mom had to go back to work, everyone suddenly noticed that preschool costs money but kindergarten is free. I took some IQ tests and must have done okay, because they went ahead and started me early.”
“So you were only four when we got married on the playground?”
I cringe. “You remember that?”
“God, I’m a pedophile!” he says dramatically, clapping a palm to his forehead. He’s trying to be funny, but I’m embarrassed. As far as I’m concerned, our kindergarten marriage has always been this mildly shameful thing, a very tiny elephant in the room. I think it’s because—technically speaking—it was my very first kiss, and I didn’t have another one until eighth grade, when Will Michaels and I made out in the sports shed on a dare. It was sweet but sloppy and—although I have a nostalgic fondness for Will to this day—kissing wasn’t something I felt like trying again for another year.
Whereas, if rumors are to be believed, Oliver was macking in fifth.
“Gross,” I tell him, and then notice he is frowning. “Now what?”
“If your birthday is in November, why is your name June?”
“It’s the month my parents met.”
“Awwwww,” he says.
“Stop it.”
“Why? It’s sweet.”
“Seriously, shut up.”
“I like it. Your name is cute and sweet and even meaningful.”
“Blah blah blah!” I say loudly, covering my ears with my hands. “I can’t hear you!”
Hey, I’m young for my grade and I’m smart. No one ever said I was mature.
Oliver pulls the wheel—
“What are you doing?” I squawk.
—and we bump off the road, startling a deer as we come to rest along the edge of a field. The deer takes off fast toward the woods, tail up and flashing white in alarm. Oliver puts the car into park and reaches toward me. I squeal (second squeal of the day) and yank backward, but of course his arms are longer, and he catches me by the wrists. Very gently, he pulls my hands away from my head and stares at me. It’s the closest we have ever been, and something about it makes me stop wiggling and go silent. Oliver smiles that bright white smile right into my eyes. “Happy birthday, June.”
And then he lets go of me and pulls back onto the road.
At first—as I’m walking down the hallway—I assume it must be someone else’s locker. The one next to mine. After all, it’s a big school; it’s not impossible that someone would share a birthday with me. Lily and Darbs have never been into balloons and streamers, so clearly this isn’t their work….
Is that lipstick?
Someone slicked Happy Birthday, June!!! over my locker in scarlet lettering. Whoever did it also taped streamers all around and set helium balloons dancing against the ceiling. I open the metal door to discover they must have blown glitter dust in through the slanted vent, because my textbooks are covered in fine sparkles.
Because that’s going to be fun to clean.
I stand looking at the craziness and trying to figure out how I feel about it. It’s a tradition that other people participate in, but that my friends and I have always eschewed as ostentatious. However, now that I’m looking at it…
Maybe it’s nice.
I take a photo and text it to both parents. It reassures them to see proof of my emotionally healthy social life. Mom’s in class, but Dad returns a message immediately:
HBD baby girl!
I also send the picture—along with a message of gratitude—to the only person who can possibly be responsible for decorating my locker.
“I’m telling you, it wasn’t me,” Shaun whispers across the aisle in AP English.
“Was it Lily, then? Or Darbs?”
“Better not be. Neither of those bitches decorated for my birthday.”
That leaves only one person. A surprisingly romantic act from someone who is not usually romantic.
The thought of it makes me smile.
“Nope.” Itch slides his hands down my rib cage to my waist. “Not my style.”
“What is your style?” Itch moved here in the middle of junior year, so I didn’t meet him until after my last birthday.
He twists his fingers through the loops in my jeans and tugs me closer. “I’ll show you on Saturday.”
“Happy birthday!” Ainsley lilts as soon as I walk into physics class, and I make the connection.
“You decorated my locker?”
She springs up and flings her arms around me, and I am acutely aware that every straight boy in the room wishes he was in my position. I give Ainsley an awkward pat on the back. “Thank you.” It’s what you say when someone you hardly know spends an inordinate amount of time on your unrequested birthday celebration. This must be life when you’re friends with the cheerleaders.
“You’re welcome!” She beams. “Were you surprised? Come sit with us at lunch.”
This is getting weirder by the minute.
“At the sundial?” Ainsley gives me a duh look. I shake my head. “I eat with Itch.”
She doesn’t even hesitate. “Bring him along!”
“And Lily?” I ask her. “And Darbs and Shaun?”
Ainsley’s eyebrows dart down in the middle, just like they did at the bonfire when she was trying to wrap her head around my playlist song. “I don’t think there are that many open seats.”
Of course.
“I’ll have lunch with you tomorrow,” I tell her, wondering how I’m going to explain this to everyone else.
“Tomorrow.” Ainsley gives me another fast hug before heading back to her lab table, where Oliver is already seated.
Watching us with interest.
Or something.
I wait for Mom out by the corner. As soon as I slide into the passenger seat, she hands me a vase of flowers. I stuff my backpack between my knees and the glove compartment so I can accept them. I’m about to thank Mom when—
“They’re from your father,” she says. “God forbid he call for our new house address.”
“He has it,” I tell her.
“Apparently he misplaced it, because he had these sent to my office.”
The flowers—deep violet hydrangea mixed with white lilies and roses in a turquoise vase—smell wonderful. I breathe in their scent. “I love them.”
“Your father has great taste,” Mom says. “I’ll give him that.”
I find the tiny envelope buried within the buds and open it up. There’s the message, called in by Dad and written in the florist’s neat slanted handwriting:
Baby girl—
You are beautiful, brilliant, special.
Hope your birthday is as wonderful as you deserve.
Love you. Miss you.
—Dad
My father’s words bloom bright and warm inside me. Something I can hold on to. Something to remember.
When I send Dad a thank-you message, he again texts back right away.
UR welcome, luv U
When we get home, Cash is there. He’s supervising a crew of plumbers and painters who are finishing up work on the downstairs bathroom. “Happy birthday.” He grins, jerking a thumb toward my mom. “She told me.”
Mom scurries into the kitchen and comes back with a foil-wrapped loaf of bread. “Rosemary,” she tells Cash. “With flax seeds.”
“Thanks.” He slides a brown paper bag brimming with fabric scraps across the floor toward her. “Upholstery remnants for you.”
I’m relieved that—this time—no one’s around to witness the strange bartering world in which we live.
Itch takes me to a tapas restaurant downtown, where we share shrimp flatbread and mushrooms sautéed with garlic and a cheese plate. After, we stop by 7-Eleven for mints (because of the garlic), and I have yet another flash of guilt as I remember hooking up with Ethan Erickson behind the building. Once again, I wonder if I should tell Itch about it. Once again, I dismiss the thought.
After our stop for fresh breath, we get back in Itch’s car and he heads us toward my house, except he drives past the turn. I shoot him a questioning look but he only strokes my leg. We pass several communities and finally come to a place where there’s a break in the tree line and streetlights. Itch turns onto a bumpy dirt road, which we follow slowly until we reach a collection of bulldozers. He turns again and we drive even more slowly for a couple hundred feet. We finally park in the center of an empty clearing, where Itch kills the engine and flicks off the headlights.
“Where are we?” I ask him.
“It’s a construction site. They’re putting in one of those big douchebag communities, but for right now”—he gestures around at the darkness—“it’s just us. We can stay as long as we want.”
“Or until my curfew.” We’ve never had tons of opportunities to do the Deed, but that’s been okay with me. I’m still new to even having a sex life. It’s fine if it’s more of a once-in-a-while thing.
Itch, on the other hand, would much prefer if it happened more often.
He leans over the emergency brake to kiss me. I shift forward in my seat to meet him, because it’s expected, because it’s what we do. His kiss is warm and slow and familiar. I’m just starting to get into it when he pulls back. “Hold on. I almost forgot.” He pops open the glove compartment and pulls out a small brown paper bag. He slides it onto my lap so I can crinkle open the top. Inside is a headset with a bow stuck to it. “Happy birthday.”
“Thank you.” I run my finger over the headset’s surface. It’s much bigger than the earbuds that came with my cell phone.
“Professional grade.” Itch must see my confusion, because he explains further. “So you don’t have to be subjected to Oliver’s crap on the way to school.” He points to the tip of the cord. “It plugs into your phone just like a regular pair. Now you can ignore him and listen to whatever you want.”
I feel my eyebrows come together and am briefly reminded of Ainsley. “That seems…”
“What?”
“Rude. To tune him out like that.”
“He’s the one who’s rude,” says Itch. “Not to mention cheesy. Didn’t you tell me he put Air Supply on the playlist?”
That song doesn’t even make sense; I’ll give Itch that. Regardless—
“Oliver is still doing me a favor,” I remind him. “It’s not like he has to drive me to school.”
“Please.” Itch snorts. “He’s not picking you up out of the goodness of his heart. His mom is forcing him to do it.”
I mull that over, trying to figure out what to say to my boyfriend. Despite what Itch thinks of Oliver—a sentiment I used to echo—now I know that he’s a decent person. Finally, I come up with this: “I already agreed to the system. We have this playlist thing going. Wearing a headset so I can listen to my own music would be cheating.”
Cheating. Like what I did this summer.
I shake the thought away.
“It’s not cheating if it’s a stupid bet in the first place,” Itch argues.
“It’s not a bet. I told you that already.” My voice rises and I don’t try to stop it. We’re at a freaking construction site. No one can hear us. “It’s a competition. It’s a game.”
“It’s bullshit.”
“It’s fun,” I say even louder. With the words comes the knowledge: it’s true.
Itch shakes his head. “You have a screwed-up definition of fun.”
I sit back against the door, crossing my arms in front of my chest. “What’s your definition? Because I honestly don’t have any idea what you think is fun. You never seem to have any.”
Itch is silent for a moment before leaning forward and turning the key. “It’s getting late.”
“I appreciate the present.”
Neither one of us is telling the truth.