Eternity

supposed to ease in time—but it seemed that with every passing day her death became more difficult to process. His throat tightened and his chest felt heavy. He was shocked and devastated by one crippling thought: that he’d never see Drea again.

In the months before she died, JD had become increasingly suspicious that Drea was developing a crush on him. There were the late-night study sessions, and the flirty anonymous texts that he suspected were her weird, secretive way of confessing her feelings. She’d once hinted as much. His cheeks got hot remembering how close they’d come to kissing the night before their AP Physics midterm . . . She’d been leaning over his leg, pointing to a diagram in his textbook, wearing his yellow buffalo-plaid flannel because it was cold. It was big on her, and falling slightly off her shoulder. He’d bent closer to grab his highlighter and she’d looked into his eyes, questioning him, daring him. But then, just when he decided to go for it—JD Fount was going to kiss Drea Feiffer—she’d put her hand on his chest and said a single word: “Em.”

And he figured it out then that Drea might like him, but somehow knew he was in love with Em, that she would only be a substitute. His chest swelled like someone was inflating a balloon in there—thinking of Drea, how smart she was, and how sweet, under all that metal and that big, fierce mouth that got her into so much trouble.

He missed her. Maybe he should have kissed her that night. Because she was funny and brilliant and because of his own dumb luck, a girl like her had liked him.

Stopped at a red light near the shopping plaza, he spotted a familiar flop of dark hair . . . it was Crow, with his guitar case slung across his back, standing in the parking lot, deep in conversation with the same girl whom JD had sat next to at Drea’s funeral service—the one with the honey-blond hair and the ribbon around her neck (it was still there, he noticed). Meg. That was her name. If she was one of Drea’s friends from another nearby town, it would make sense that Crow knew her too. And he definitely seemed to know her. They were talking so intensely that their faces were just inches apart. JD watched as Crow grabbed her arm with one hand and gesticulated madly with his other one. They appeared to be . . . close. Boyfriend-girlfriend close.

He felt a flash of anger, wondering whether Em knew about this girl. Why did she always fall for these two-faced guys? First Zach McCord, who gave “shithead” a new definition; and now Crow, who was more consumed with his image and his stupid guitar than with Em’s happiness. And now, apparently, he’d found a distraction with this other, ribbon-wearing chick . . .

JD couldn’t understand what seemed to be willful blindness on Em’s part, at least where her heart was concerned. She deserved better. She deserved someone who understood her, who knew how to care for her and what flavor ice cream she liked best (rum raisin), what her favorite movie was (Dirty Dancing), and how to make her laugh until she spit soda from her nose (tickle her ankles). JD knew that he was jumping to a whole lot of conclusions—and being slightly judgmental, which was Em’s long-standing criticism of him, but he couldn’t help it.

His phone beeped, and he reached over to grab it from the passenger seat. The text was from Jenny, one of Melissa’s best friends.

Melissa got hurt. Someone’s taking her home.

“Terrific,” he muttered. “Now what?”

As the light changed from red to green, JD glanced in the rearview mirror just in time to see Crow getting into his red-and-silver pickup truck. Red Ribbon Girl was nowhere to be seen—it was like she’d disappeared completely in the few seconds JD wasn’t looking. Strange. The click-clack of his turn signal seemed louder than usual.

He stepped on the gas, only to see a flash of white just in front of his tires, directly in his path. JD sucked in his breath and swerved to the right, slamming on the brakes right in the middle of the intersection. Cars going the other way honked and moved around him. As the car skidded to a stop, JD’s heart still pounding, he made momentary eye contact with a thin white cat, mangy and mean, standing right in the middle of all the traffic, just staring back at him. It appeared to have something hanging from its mouth. Something red. For a second, he was almost sure it was the red ribbon he’d seen the girl wearing just minutes before. Christ. Was he hallucinating now? The cat’s eyes shone black in the quickening dusk.

Cats had always unsettled him; they gave the impression that they knew so much more than they let on— and this one was no exception. JD beeped his horn and the cat paused for another second before turning and moving off languidly into the shrubs on the side of the road.

He drove the rest of the way home with his hands white-knuckled around the steering wheel, then burst in the front door calling his sister’s name.

“Mel? Melly? What’s up? Where—” He stopped short when he saw her sprawled on the living room couch, her right ankle wrapped in sports tape and propped up on a million pillows. She looked at JD with the wide-eyed excitement of someone who has just discovered a new toy—or in her case, social-networking platform.

“I hurt my ankle, JD, practicing for the spring cheer-squad tryouts,” she said. “I thought it was broken!”

“Why didn’t you call me?” JD said. “I got a text from Jenny.”

Mel shrugged. “My phone was dead again.” She was always killing her phone battery from all the use it got. It was getting to be a miracle for that phone to make it past two p.m. without a recharge.

For the first time, he noticed a soda and a bag of popcorn sitting next to her on the coffee table. She looked like she was having the time of her life. His heartbeat started to slow.

He came to sit down next to her. “Are you okay now?”

“I’m fine,” Melissa said. “Ali says it’s just bruised.”

“Ali . . . ? Who’s—”

“I’m Ali,” a voice said from the doorway.

JD turned to see a girl with practically white-blond hair leaning easily in the door frame. She was holding a bag of ice.

And she was gorgeous. Like, magazine-cover-supermodel gorgeous.

“Um, hell-hi,” he stammered. His brain seemed to be trying to work through sludge. “And . . . who are you?”

“Ali saved me,” Melissa piped in. “Me and Jenny were practicing near her house—you know where she lives, right, kind of near the Behemoth? And I slipped ’cause it’s so freaking muddy! And Ali was just right there —”

“I just happened to be driving by at the right time,” Ali said, handing Melissa the ice pack. Her movements were easy and practiced. Maybe she really was a model; he could picture her on a runway. “And I offered to take her home. I hope that’s okay.”

“I guess . . . I mean, thank you,” JD said, still mystified over the appearance of this girl in his living room. “Mel, did you call Mom and Dad?”

“Not yet,” Melissa said. “I haven’t even plugged my phone in yet. It all happened so fast, you know?”

“You’ve been away from your phone for more than five minutes? Wow, you must really be hurt,” JD said. He reached over and mussed Mel’s hair, and she shrieked and ducked away from him. He sniffed. “Is something burning?”

“Nothing burns unless I want it to,” Ali said with a smirk before she headed back in the direction of the Founts’ kitchen. She walked like she owned the place. Like she’d been here before.

“Ali’s making me Pop-Tarts,” Melissa said. “She said she wanted to stick around until someone got home.”

JD looked at Melissa’s ankle, which was encased in a mound of white medical gauze. “And you’re sure you’re okay? How do you—how does she—know it’s not broken?”

“Ali’s studying to be a nurse,” Melissa informed him. “And yes, I can stand on it. It just hurts. I’ll be fine, JD. It’s not bad at all. Don’t tell Mom and Dad, though. I want to milk this. I have a stupid English test tomorrow and I haven’t even studied.” She shook out a handful of popcorn into her palm and ate the whole thing in one go. He couldn’t help but laugh. There was the Melly he knew.

Still, he couldn’t quite relax. Something was off. He didn’t know if it was the adrenaline from his drive home, or the presence of the new girl, or what, but the energy in the room was electric.