Page 40 of Lonely Hearts Day

And because I didn’t want to have to stay after school for detention, I sat down. I could talk to Jack in forty-five minutes. I picked up the rose on my desk and brought it to my nose. Never in my life would I have thought a school-bought rose would mean this much to me, but it did.

I saw what Laney meant about declaring my intentions though. Because even though Jack’s poem was beautiful, I had no idea if he was asking for our friendship back or for something more. And after hearing what Troy and Laney had to say today about what Jack knew and when he knew it, I wasn’t sure what I wanted, either. But we owed each other a talk, at the very least.

After school, I searched for Jack. He was nowhere. I pulled out my phone to text him and was distracted by our last set of texts from Valentine’s Day a year ago. Texts I’d read many times over the last twelve months.

Jack:I nearly died of embarrassment first period. They rhymedbrownwitharound town.

Me:Maybe it’s harder to write good poetry than we realize.

Jack:The problem is they’re not writing the poem to anyone in particular. They’re writing it to the faceless masses. There’s nothing personal about it. There’s no emotion. Poetry only works when driven by emotion.

Me:I didn’t realize you were a poetry critic.

Jack:It’s just common sense.

Me:I don’t think it is. I’m going to nominate you to write next year’s poem.

Jack:And then I will never speak to you again.

It had been a joke—the never speaking to me again thing. I knew it when I’d read it the first time. But the hundred times I’d read it after that had stung. After, it felt like foreshadowing, a sign. Now, the rest of the exchange was sinking in.Poetry only works when driven by emotion, he’d said. He was obviously feeling something today.

Where did you go?I texted now.I want to talk.

Me too,he texted back almost immediately.I had to go home to let the puppy out of the crate. I promised my mom I would.

You got a puppy?Why did that revelation make me want to cry? What else had I missed in his life? It felt like everything.

My dad bought it for my mom for Valentine’s Day. Crazy, right? You know my parents.

I wanted to type:Can’t we talk now? Don’t you want to see me now?

I just typed:Crazy.

He returned with:You’re going to Troy’s party tonight?

Yes.

Me too.

So that was the plan? To see each other tonight? It felt like torture. But I’d waited a year, I could wait a few more hours.

“What is that?” Laney asked as I approached her car in the parking lot. I was digging my keys out of my pocket to unlock my car door.

She was standing at the trunk, throwing in her backpack.

I smiled and pretended to hug the rose. “My very first school-bought Valentine’s rose.”

“From who?” she asked as I joined her at her trunk. It was full of Christmas decorations we had used in the school musical.

“You still haven’t cleaned out your trunk?”

“Don’t rush me,” she said. “It gives me a hit of dopamine every time I open it and see this festive display.” She shut her trunk and pulled my hand holding the rose toward her nose, taking a long inhale.

I flipped the card attached to it, revealing the poem.

“Don’t make me read that terrible poem for the seventh time today.”

“No, it’s not the school poem.”