I take out my own phone and catch up on what I missed. I see Sydney’s desperate messages first.
Cleo. I need you.
How do I Shakespeare?
Where are you even?
HEEELLLPPP.
They make me laugh. Next, I see one from Dom. Got your phone back yet, Shorty?
Right below his message I see a name I haven’t seen in months—a name I thought I’d never see on my phone again. Layla.
I need to talk to you.
Something about the message makes me instantly angry. My temperature rises. Just as I’m well on my way to forgetting that she exists, she reinserts herself into my life with a dumb, vague text. I’m tempted to send her something awful back, something like Well, I never want to talk to YOU again, but that’s when my mom’s voice chirps loudly right next to me, her call having ended as abruptly as it started.
“So, as I was saying. I really need you to take a more active role in your education, Cleo. You’re a sophomore, and you’ll be going off to college soon, but as a young black woman everything is going to be more challenging for you. People will expect less of you just because of the way you look. So if you need me to physically walk you into that building, I will, just so you understand the gravity of the situation. As a matter of fact, I’d like to know why they didn’t call me about your absences. But I’m running late and—”
“I don’t think I’ll get lost between the station and the four blocks it takes to get to school,” I say darkly, thinking more about Layla than anything else. The school has been calling our landline, but I’ve been deleting the messages before Mom gets home. Her blood-red nails, which have been tapping away at the screen of her cellphone, freeze, and she takes a step closer to me. When I look up, her eyes are shining like the raindrop-shaped black diamonds in her earlobes. Her voice comes out low and fast.
“Watch your mouth, Cleo Imani. My concern is not unfounded.”
I want to roll my eyes again, but I’d risk an even more embarrassing public scolding. I look left and right, but the other people on the platform aren’t paying us any attention. Sometimes it feels like my whole life is playing out for whoever is close enough to see it.
“I know,” I whisper in her direction, hoping my tone is even enough that it won’t earn me a quick, stinging pop across the lips. Naomi Bell brings the same ferocity to everything she does—she is not opposed to making her point by any means necessary, as a publicist or a mother.
“Okay, then,” she says.
I straighten my glasses and stand beside her, wishing she were more like Gigi; wishing I could make everything about us better and nicer and easier; wishing that either I were still friends with Layla or I could somehow make every trace of her disappear from my life forever.
The platform rumbles, and we both take a step back. The train is coming, and it feels like a sign.
Or a warning.
then: August
THE FIRST DAY
When school started, things were weird almost instantly.
For one thing, Jase was acting like we were all best friends.
“Lay!” he said, throwing his arms wide, calling Layla by my nickname for her. Since he and I no longer kissed, he was not allowed to use that, but I didn’t know how to take the term of endearment away from him. Besides, what’s in a name and all that, right?
I mean, his name means “healer,” but we broke up.
“Cleo Imani Baker,” he sang next, and though we were cool and everything post-breakup, we weren’t hang-out-in-the-hall-before-class cool. Layla nudged me in the ribs and widened her eyes in Mason’s direction. He was a few feet away from us, and she clearly wanted to go talk to him. I realized then that Jase didn’t really want to talk to me—he was just wingmanning it for Mason. I sighed and slipped my arm out of hers to let her go.
“Hey, Jase,” I said flatly. “I’m gonna be late.”
This wasn’t exactly true and Jase knew it, so he was at best undeterred and at worst encouraged. He took a few steps closer to me, and I could smell the sweetness of the product he used in his hair. It made me remember what his collarbone felt like against my lips. It made me want to hide.
I kept my distance, but Jase didn’t, and when he lifted one of my long braids, I swatted it out of his hand.
“Jesus, chill, Cleo. I was just going to say, I like this.” He gestured at my hair.
My braids were fresh; my edges, laid. I was wearing a loosely knitted black sweater over my uniform shirt, and my favorite floral combat boots. It was the first day of school, so of course I looked good.
“Oh,” I said. I tossed a handful of the braids over my shoulder with a flourish. “Thanks.”
I tried to get Layla’s attention, but she was still talking to Mason, who was touching the collar of her shirt.
“I’ll meet you in Mr. Yoon’s class?” I said to Layla, hoping she’d take the hint and come with me, but she nodded kind of absently, not getting it. So I just straightened my glasses and headed to the stairwell alone.
“I’ll walk with you,” Jase said. And before I could tell him, No, thank you, he was on the stairs above me hopping up them backward like an overgrown five-year-old.
“How was the rest of your summer?” he asked me.
“It was okay. I hung out at that new coffee shop by my building. Layla dragged me to some concerts. So, normal, I guess. How was yours?”
Jase grinned, and his dimples were just as cute as I remembered.
“Pretty okay,” he said. “My parents are riding me about balancing soccer and grades and keep threatening to make me quit the team.”
I frowned. I knew how much Jase loved soccer. He shook his head. “Don’t look so concerned. It’s just typical Asian parent shit.” Then a little wrinkle creased his forehead. “But I guess I’ve…missed you?” he said. “Am I allowed to say that?”
I paused on the stairs. I didn’t miss him, not like that.
“Not like that,” he said quickly, reading my face again. “Not like let’s get back together.”
“Good,” I said. “We broke up for the right reasons. And look, I know you’re only stuck with me right now because Mason is trying to hook up with Layla. I get it. You don’t have to lie or pretend you really want to hang out.”
I started walking again, wishing Layla were there, wondering what it would be like when she started dating Mason for real (because it felt pretty inevitable). Would Jase and I have to have these awkward interactions all the time?