"No!"

"But you'd be so great at it."

I sigh, knowing I'm about to disappoint her. "Lane, we're three days into the semester, and it's senior year, and I have track meets and practice and-"

"And it'll be the last thing we get to do together," she says, and I'm listening again.

"How much time and how closely do we,"-I point between us-"work together?"

"Is that a yes?"

Those G.o.dd.a.m.n eyes.

She practically leaps into my arms and onto my lap and she doesn't need a verbal response because she knows me. "This is going to be great, Luke. You'll see!"

She has dinner with my family-old times-and Dad forces her to spend the night because Brian's still in Savannah with Misty, and Dad doesn't like the idea of her being in her house alone. I didn't know she was alone, or I'd have offered her my bed. I would've even gone as far as not sleeping in it with her. She agrees, eagerly. At 7:00, I do my one minute with Lachlan and head back to the apartment where she's waiting for me. I sit on the floor between the couch and the coffee table and do my homework while she sprawls out on the couch and watches a movie. At 10:30, she's fast asleep. At 10:48, I stop watching her sleep and get a blanket to cover her. Then I go to my room and send my sister a text: Lucas: Do you know what a Felicity and a Ben are?

Lucy: OMGOMGOMGOMG. YES!!!! Why?

Lucas: Who are they?

Lucy: Who are they to YOU?!

Lucas: Laney and I were talking about UNC, and she said she was no Felicity and Cooper was no Ben.

Lucy: Well, duh. Cooper is more like her Noel (but an a.s.shole version of him) or maybe even that artsy guy she had that fling with. Dude! YOU are her Ben Covington. Seriously.

Lucas: I'm so f.u.c.king lost.

Lucy: There's this amazing thing called Google. Use it.

Lucy: PS - If Cooper isn't her Ben, it's a good thing, bro.

At 2 am and after numerous Google searches that would make any hacker a.s.sume I'm a (female) mildly obsessed, romance-drama circa late 90s TV junkie, I find out that Ben Covington was kind of a d.i.c.k (me), but he loved Felicity (Lane), he just didn't know what to do with that love (Me! Me! Me!)

Chapter Twenty-Two.

LUCAS.

The day after Laney's visit, I tell Dad about the spring play and about not really having time for it but agreeing only because it meant spending time with Laney. "It's like I'm a dog, and she's just thrown me a bone," I tell him.

He says, "You can't teach an old dog new tricks." Which is completely irrelevant, as are his next eleventy-three life-lesson a.n.a.logies all related to dogs. Then he goes on to tell me about Rusty, the German Shepard he had growing up. When he's done, I just stare at him. "Sorry," he says, "Kind of went off on a tangent there, huh?"

"Just a tad."

"So what are you going to do?" he asks.

I rub the back of my neck, already feeling the stress from the added workload that hasn't even started yet.

"I have an idea," he tells me. "It'll be good. Trust me."

His idea isn't just good. It's great. Brilliant, even.

He makes my brothers do it, too. School spirit and all. (Rah rah rah!) I do my part, get Dumb Name in on it, too. "Just think of the girls, Garray. They change into costumes right there in the open. Some even show their t.i.ts!" They don't.

Leo's up for it because Angela, a soph.o.m.ore and his current conquest, got the lead.

And Logan... Well, he has no f.u.c.king choice. Dad still has him on probation for his joyous time with a joint.

It's been three weeks now and Garray, Leo and I have found a rhythm and we work well together. Logan's f.u.c.king useless until you get a paintbrush in his hand and give him direct instructions.

"Logan, do something, bruh!" Garray says. He spent the winter break visiting his grandparents in California, and now he calls everyone "bruh." It's so f.u.c.king cringeworthy, but you can't tell him that.

I give Logan a brush, tell him to paint the particle board I just cut to size the reddest red he can find. He does it, no questions. But he chuckles, mumbles to himself the entire time. "Dude," he tells me. "This is so f.u.c.king therapeutic and s.h.i.t." ... Okay?

The next day, I have a conversation with Coach Anderman about Logan, and he gives me a cup. "Tell him to p.i.s.s in it and bring it back to me. I'll take care of it."

I make Logan p.i.s.s in the cup.

It comes back positive for marijuana.

"It's so f.u.c.king therapeutic and s.h.i.t, bruh," Garray mocks when I tell Logan the results. Logan throws a swing at him. Garray ducks it. Leo laughs. I sigh.

The truth is, I don't really care if Logan smokes weed. I personally don't do it because being clean is a requirement to be on the track team, and track is my ticket to UNC. As long as he's not breaking the rules at home and burning down the house, it doesn't bother me. It bothers Dad, though, and his reasoning is justifiable. Dad had been on the wrong end of addiction with alcohol when Mom pa.s.sed away, and so he thinks it might run in the family. Addiction is scary because it's unsteady, uncontrollable, and has the potential to damage everything in its path. I tell Lane all this while she sketches out a costume for Juliet (our school is big on Shakespeare) as we sit outside for lunch. "You know what you should do?" she says, looking up at me, her eyes bright against the spring sun. "Come over for dinner tonight. Misty's cooking. Talk to her about it. She might know a way to help." She looks back down at her sketchpad and smiles at her work and I stare and I stare and I wonder if maybe Logan's good, great even, and I'm the one who needs help because I'm addicted to you, Laney.

I go to dinner and Misty says she'll drag Logan's a.s.s down to one of the volunteer counseling sessions she does for drug addiction, and the people there will scare the weed right out of his system. She's also going to talk to my dad, ask permission to collect a sample of Logan's p.i.s.s every day for twenty-one days.

Dad agrees.

Logan gets so mad.

By the final day, his urine is crystal clean.

Yay, teamwork!

Between building s.h.i.t for the set, track meets, training, family, I barely have time to breathe, but you know what? Laney was right. I am great at it, and Laney and I do get to spend a lot of time together.

Old times have become now times and small talk is purely conversation. Even when it comes to Cooper. "You heading to UNC this weekend or is Cooper coming home?" I ask, sitting opposite her, our legs crossed, making flowers out of tissue paper and wire. Hers look like they belong in a museum. Mine look like dog s.h.i.t. Meanwhile, Leo, Logan and Garray attempt to piece together the set for the infamous balcony scene.

"I'm not sure," she mumbles, looking at the time.

I look at the time, too. It's 4:48 on a Thursday afternoon and my crew, she, and I are the only ones left in the drama room. Miss Lepsitch, the drama teacher, should be here, too. But she's probably sucking face with Coach Anderman in a broom closet somewhere. "Are you waiting for him to call?" I push.

She shrugs, focuses on the flower that's already done. She doesn't really talk much about him anymore, at least not to me, and whether that's a conscious decision she's made or the hype of him has worn off, I'm not sure.

"You guys are still together, right?" I try, digging for more information.

"Yeah," she says quickly. "We're still together. It's just hard... you know..." She glances up at me, searches for a reaction. She won't see anything. No anger. No spite. h.e.l.l, it took Ben and Felicity what literally felt like an eternity to finally get their s.h.i.t together. Four seasons and one abrupt ending and I still don't have closure. But I did learn that my best tactic was to wait. And so waiting is what I'm doing. Plus, my mom was a big believer in fate. If it was meant to be, it would happen. Eventually.

"Are you missing him?" I ask.

She clears her throat, looks up at me, her eyes glazed.

s.h.i.t. "Did I say something?"

Her head moves, side to side, slowly, slowly. "There's so much I want to tell you," she breathes. "But it's..."

I shuffle closer, place my hands on her knees. "It's what, Lane?"

Her throat bobs with her swallow and she looks away. "It's..."

I hear footsteps approaching, but I'm too focused, too addicted to turn to the sound. "Lane?" I push, squeezing her knees.

"Lois?" f.u.c.k you, Cooper Kennedy.

Her eyes are huge, her breath caught in her throat while Cooper stands above me like an angry giant, clenching and unclenching his fists. "Get your hands off my girlfriend, Preston."

Laney pushes my hands away. "I didn't know... you didn't say..." She stumbles to her feet and stands between Cooper and me, her hands on his chest, protecting me. "Let's go, Coop."

I don't need her f.u.c.king protection and I stand, my chest out, shoulders square and look down on him. "We're just friends, a.s.shole!"

"You touch all your friends like that?" he spits, his words echoing through the room.

The guys hear his bulls.h.i.t and come running. Leo gets between us. "Leave it alone, man," he says to me, his tone calm. He should be Leonardo, the ninja turtle. The smart, tranquil, leader of the brotherhood.

"What the f.u.c.k's going on?" Garray snaps.

Lane tugs on Cooper's arm, forcing him toward the door. They're almost out when Logan shouts, his hands cupped around his mouth, "Pedophile alert!"

I wait three hours and forty-six minutes to text Lane from Leo's phone.

Leo: I'm sorry about what Logan said. He was out of line. Are we still on to finish up the set tomorrow afternoon? -CK That's what our friendship has become, sneaking in text messages and signing off in code (CK = Clark Kent) to settle her boyfriend's jealousy and keep the peace with them.

It takes her nine minutes to respond.

Lane: It's okay. It's not your fault. It's mine. I shouldn't have let Lucas touch me like that. I know that now. I'll see you tomorrow at 3 pm. Great job, today! Thanks for everything, Leo.

I give Leo back his phone and don't bother with a reply, because what the f.u.c.k, Lane?

She doesn't show the next day.

She doesn't call, doesn't text, doesn't email.

She's not at school Monday, so I make contact with her.

Leo: You sick or something? Need me to come around? - CK.

Lane: No.

Lane: I'm not home.

Lane: I won't be at school for a couple of days, but I'm okay. Thanks for checking in, Leo.

It's not just a couple of days she's off school. It's an entire week. I call Brian, ask how she is and he tells me that she got a horrible flu when she was at UNC over the weekend. She's so sick that she can't even come home. She's holed up in his dorm room but it's fine, he tells me, because Cooper's there and he's taking care of her. I wonder if Brian knows about New Year's Eve and the houseboat and Cooper's lack of taking care of her then-one night. How the h.e.l.l has he taken care of her for an entire week?

If I didn't have to finish these stupid sets and compete in a race and take the twins to basketball and then Lachlan to a birthday party and hand deliver Logan's now-weekly p.i.s.s cup to Misty at the police station, my a.s.s would be in my truck, driving to UNC, punching Cooper in the face (f.u.c.k, I want to do that so bad) and throwing Laney over my shoulder to take her home. She'd sit in my apartment and I'd take care of her. Soup, meds and back rubs. I'd nurse her back to health and she'd call me her hero and she'd dump Cooper and then we'd have s.e.x on the bed where I put the final nail in the coffin of bringing her back to life. s.h.i.t. I'm Dad with a dog story and there was my tangent.

But, I do have to do all those things, and I can't even call her to see how she is because that f.u.c.ker still has me blocked.

Monday rolls around, opening night, and everyone involved in the play, including Miss Lepsitch, is going out of their ever-loving minds because the costumes! Where the f.u.c.k are the costumes? I begin to panic as much as everyone else because now I feel like I'm part of this insanity called The Spring Play, and dammit, I worked hard for it. In the afternoon, Leo tries calling Lane. Garray tries calling Lane. Even I try calling Lane-it doesn't even ring. Logan sits on a makeshift throne made for King Capulet, or Sir Capulet, or whatever the f.u.c.k Juliet's dad was, and says, "You know, maybe Cooper's one of those crazy cats who's, like, stupid obsessed with our little Laney, and he's got her hidden in a dungeon or something. She probably loves him because of that... what's it called? You know that thing..." He clicks his fingers while my brain throbs. "When the captured fall for their captor?"

"Stockholm syndrome," Leo tells him.

"Bruh," Garray says.

"Or you know," Logan continues, and I wish he'd shut the f.u.c.k up. "Maybe he's that f.u.c.king in love with her he killed her and then himself, like this here,"-he raises a finger, spins it in circles-"Romero and Juliet."

Leo says, "Romeo and Juliet, d.i.c.kwad. Smoke another joint."

"Can't." Logan jumps off the chair. "Hot Cop Lady is all up in my s.h.i.t thanks to Luke."

Swear my brain literally explodes and for some f.u.c.ked-up reason, I actually believe (for a second) that Logan is onto something. I mean, Cooper's not a f.u.c.king nutjob, right? He's just your standard self-ent.i.tled d.i.c.k.

"Costumes are here!" Miss Lepsitch shouts, and I practically sprint over to her.

"Where's Lane?"

"Who?"

There are people everywhere now, trying to find their costumes amongst the pile in her arms.

"Lois! Where's Lois?"

"She just dropped these off. She's gone back home. She must really not be feeling well."

I tell the boys I'm out and put Leo in charge, then waste nineteen seconds arguing with Dumb Name about why he's not in charge simply because he was born a couple of years earlier.