I narrowed my eyes at him. “Your pumpkin spice is giving me a headache.”
“Plus the Boo-Bash is the best, Blaire. Everyone around here treats it like a second prom. It’s, like, the biggest event of the fall, and you know it.”
I did know it, and I dreaded it every year. “Sounds like torture.”
“Just saying, if you fully experienced Halloween instead of locking yourself in your bedroom, you’d like it.” Donnie gestured at me. “I mean, look at you. You have a skull-and-crossbones backpack. You have creepy pictures in your locker. How do you hate the spookiest month of the year?”
As I hung my bag on the hook, I realized he wasn’t wrong. The paper clippings on my locker wall were of strange things—owls with glowing eyes, dark forests, broken stepping stones in a walkway. Random things I’d found as I flipped through magazines and cut out. I guess they could’ve been a little bit spooky.
I hadn’t always hated Halloween. Once upon a time, I’d enjoyed it. That felt like a lifetime ago.
I shook my head. “Just because I like the aesthetic of it doesn’t mean I have to like the month.”
“Donnie’s right,” Lucas said, tapping his fingers against my open locker door. His gaze traced over the clippings and taped pictures. Something in his eyes tightened as he looked away. “If you fully experienced Halloween, you’d love it.”
“What the heck does ‘fully experiencing Halloween’ mean?” It sounded creepy. And exhausting.
“You just need help to see the greatness in the holiday,” he said, eyebrows rising and falling. “Help from your friends.”
My first instinct was to scoff, loudly and in his face, but I found myself still under his azure gaze as it focused down at me. Sarcasm coated my voice thickly. “You’re saying you want to show me the joy of pumpkins and ghosts?”
“I’m saying I’m willing to help cure you of your bitterness.”
“God knows she’s got a lot of it,” Donnie quipped.
Lucas’s attention lifted over my head to flash my cousin a grin. My coffee warmed my hands, searing my fingers. Donnie had forgotten to get a sleeve.
I didn’t want to be the grouch of Halloween, didn’t want to put a damper on the holiday, but this was a slippery slope.
I could be strong enough, though. Spending time with Lucas didn’t mean things went back to how they were. I could be strong enough to remember why I’d done what I had in the first place—I had enough self-discipline.
My gaze leveled with Lucas’s. “You have three chances to convince me October doesn’t suck. Three outings.”
“Five.”
“What? No. You don’t get to negotiate terms.”
Lucas, though, wasn’t stopping. “Four.”
Donnie made a noise. “Definitely four. Gram taught you how to compromise, Blaire.”
I could’ve smacked him. He was supposed to be on my side. “Fine. Four chances, and Donnie has to be present for every one of them.”
“You don’t trust me?” Lucas asked, batting his dark and beautiful lashes.
More like I don’t trust myself.
“Hey, I don’t mind tagging along on your soul-searching journey,” Donnie said, shrugging. “As long as there are no haunted houses.”
“Deal.” Lucas plucked my espresso from my numb fingertips. He had it half raised to his mouth before he paused. “You weren’t going to drink this, right?”
I wasn’t. Donnie had killed the coffee with sweetness. The only thing worse than a sweet coffee was a letter from my long-lost father, and I had one of those too. Sitting in my backpack. Taunting me. Haunting me.
But there was something about watching Lucas place his lips on the spot where my own had been, the thought of the hot liquid pooling in his mouth. A flash of heat warmed my veins, followed by an icy chill.
I didn’t even say anything when I slammed my locker shut, practically running away from the two of them. This time, though, when I walked away, neither boy followed.
I struggled on my homework that night, my thoughts trailing from calculus questions to everything else going on. I felt bitter. Pessimistic. Negative. It was like I couldn’t help it. Everything that came from my mouth was just…cynical. Recalling how I’d spoken to Lucas today physically hurt, a knife stabbing my insides. I would’ve thought he’d be the last person I’d speak that way to, but no.
Even down to Mrs. Wilson’s costume party last Saturday. I’d been annoyed too. And because of, what—my pinching shoes? What was up with that?
I blamed it on Dad’s stupid letter. Things had been going so well before I’d gotten it. I’d been coming off of the best summer since Mom had died, Lucas and I had been dating happily for over a year, and my junior year of high school had loomed on the horizon. Everything had been perfect, up until I’d pulled that ugly envelope out of the mailbox. And then my world had fallen apart.
A sharp shriek echoed through the apartment, though slightly muffled through my closed bedroom door, causing me to jerk my pen across my worksheet. “Gram?” I shouted, heart drumming into high-gear, and I shoved to my feet. “Gram! Are you okay?”
I threw my door open when she didn’t answer me, bursting into the living room. With the scream still echoing in my ears, I expected to see Gram’s small body crumpled on the floor from a heart attack or her finger sliced open from a kitchen knife. Something.
Instead, she sat at the kitchen table, laptop open in front of her, a wide grin on her face.
“Jeez,” I muttered, pressing a palm to my chest. My heart didn’t want to settle down, not yet. “I thought you broke a hip or something, Gram.”
That wide grin faltered, but only slightly. “Oh, I’m not that old. But come look, quick!”
“Did you open up a spam email again?” I asked, rounding the table. “I told you not to click on anything if you don’t recognize who sent it.”
Gram pointed a frail finger on the computer, not caring how her fingerprints would transfer onto the screen. “Just look, would you?”
I looked and immediately figured out why she’d screamed.
The subject line read Halloween Boo-Bash Catering Request.
Of flipping course.
“They’re asking me to cater!” she exclaimed, fidgeting in her seat. “Or, well, us, but still! This is huge, Blaire. They usually always hire out some fancy bigwig company from Bayview.”
“’Bout time they went local,” I huffed, and though her excitement was so exuberant, I couldn’t quite get myself to share it. I pushed off the table, heading to the fridge. “Can you make it fit into your schedule? It’s so last minute.”
“Of course I can make it fit! This is the Boo-Bash we’re talking about.” She leaned forward, reading the email with her mouth wide open.
The amazingly wonderful Boo-Bash. Ugh. It was bad enough the party had been advertised on my locker—now we had to cater it too? I guess I couldn’t avoid it this year.
I went to the fridge to pour myself a glass of soda, the kitchen holding a stifling sort of silence, nothing but the fizz of my pop filling the air. “I’m happy for you, Gram,” I forced out after a moment, looking at where she sat. “This is huge for you.”