Page 5 (1/2)

In the ninth grade, I’d gotten one candygraotten over twenty, and she made sure to carry the queen as a sopho unheard of at our school, and pro invited by a senior The fa stick had always been just a few inches too tall for raduated, I’d breathed a little freer, thinking I wouldn’t be compared to her anye of twelve years of school with the sali in her shadow—and then the lifelong eclipse circled right back around

Jules was put out to pasture like an old, crusty cow, and Laura becaood-son-of-a—stars And now they were getting otten where their happily-ever-after started

We h a mutual friend

It sounded less scandalous the way they told it

So I wasn’t exactly ju stranded on the country estate where the social-cli members of the Kelland faeh, Laura wasthe scene of the crie voith a man who looked at me like no other

o there with Dad during the summers

Pardon

“Jules, do you mind if I take a feith , knee-weakening se tub of cookies in his hand

“Why, hello there” Laura nearly knocked ht for Berk

“Hey” He looked around like a deer caught in headlights

“I’m Laura Kelland” She looked over her shoulder at me “A friend of yours?”

Berk’s gaze bounced between htened my arms across my chest The pit in my stomach sprouted a trunk and a few branches as I braced myself for the questions I’d been asked so many times

Standing beside my mom and sister, I always looked like the weird cousin they introduced for coot stale When Dad was alive, it had all made sense Laura looked like Mom’s mini-me, I took after hione, I was the odd one out—always

“Laura, this is Berk Berk, my sister Laura”

Here colances between ht, whereas she was a petite but y five-four Next to me she almost felt pocket-sized