Immaculate

I hoped that she was right, of course, even if I wasn’t nearly as confident about the last two suspects as she was. But I still couldn’t shake it, the feeling of being watched that had followed me everywhere since the first day of school.

“And let’s be real, Meen,” she said, popping a few red grapes into her mouth. “There are plenty of other reasons for people to be talking. You and Nate broke up out of absolutely nowhere, and neither of you will say why or how that happened, and Izzy hasn’t so much as waved at you in the hallway since we got back. And, to top it off, you and I are sitting alone at lunch like some rejected, pathetic castaways. Everyone is obviously wondering what you did to a

“Wow. Thank you, Ha

She winced and I looked away, frustrated with both of us. In a moment of weakness, I couldn’t stop myself from peeking over at the exact spot that I so painstakingly avoided each lunch period, the big oval table closest to the counter where Ha

But now, after seeing how quickly and neatly I could be removed from the equation, I couldn’t help but think I’d never belonged as much as I had let myself believe. They looked unchanged to me now, sitting there at our old table, as if nothing at all had shaken up the established equilibrium. Sasha, Molly, Qui

I watched Nate and Izzy, their chairs on opposite ends, as far apart as two people could be without sitting at two different tables. I could tell, even from my position halfway across the room, that they were carefully avoiding each other. They’d nod and laugh along with the group when the other talked, but they didn’t go out of their way to say anything one-on-one—probably because the one thing and the one person they’d most like to talk about wouldn’t make for appropriate lunchroom conversation. Otherwise, they looked entirely normal, happy, and at ease. No one would ever have guessed that either of them was secretly torn up on the inside, devastated with missing me. Maybe that was because they weren’t. Maybe they’d both already moved on.

A sudden thought banged against me like a fist to the gut. Had they been talking outside of school? Were they comparing notes about me? Going over all the reasons why I was a horrible best friend and a horrible girlfriend? The idea of the two of them bonding over some newly discovered mutual hate made me feel sick. And it also made me furious. I had done nothing wrong. Not a single thing. They just couldn’t believe that—they couldn’t believe me.

But I wouldn’t cry. I wouldn’t cry. I wouldn’t cry.

“I’m sorry, Mina. I didn’t mean for it to sound like that,” Ha

I tore my eyes away from Nate, who was in the middle of telling a story that had the entire table in hysterics. But just as I was about to turn back to Ha

Arielle was the head cheer captain and the shoo-in lead for school plays, a blending of after-school worlds that usually didn’t collide. But she was u

“Meen?” Ha

I took a deep breath to stop myself from exploding, to remind myself that her intentions were good, even if they weren’t always spectacularly executed. She was trying her best; she genuinely was. She could have sat at our old table with all her other friends who didn’t hate her, but she hadn’t. I doubted that the idea had even crossed her mind. I exhaled and looked into her brilliant blue eyes.

“But it’s not just how it looks from the outside, is it, Ha

“You have Gracie, though.”

She said that as if it made up for everything else—as if this one vote of support in my favor could make all the difference. And maybe it did, to be honest, because I don’t know how I could have woken up every morning if Gracie had turned against me, too.