True. Dad was seventeen when I was born.

Mom was fifteen. Dad knew he wanted her. He took her and made me. But Scott is missing the point. “He told me that himself because I, uh…made a mistake.” I am a mistake.

Scott stares at me with those blue eyes that are much gentler than Dad’s and much more full of life than Mom’s. I don’t want anger and bitterness in my eyes.

“When I was in third grade, a guy came to the trailer and at first everything was fine, but then he and Dad began to argue. The guy reached to the back of his jeans and he pulled out a gun.” A shiver runs through my body. My eyes dart in front of me. I see my backpack, the floorboard, the stereo in the car, but my body reacts like I’m back in the trailer.

“He pointed it at Dad and when Dad laughed he pointed the gun at me. It was so close.”

Very close. Close enough I could feel the metal on my forehead. Mom screamed and warm urine streamed down my legs onto the floor.

“Elisabeth,” Scott softly urges.

“They argued some more and he cocked the trigger.” It made a frightening sound—click, clitch. I rub the goose bumps forming on my arms. I knew I was going to die and I remember praying to God that it wouldn’t hurt.

Mom screamed and screamed and screamed.

“Dad threw a sack of money at him. He uncocked the gun and lowered it.” I ran. Past Mom, who collapsed on the floor crying. Past Dad, cursing the man out. Past the bathroom and into Mom and Dad’s bedroom. “I hid under the bed and I called the police.”

Scott shakes his head as he stares out the windshield to the entrance of my school. “How much heroin was in the house?”

“I don’t know,” I whisper. “Mom found me on the phone and she realized what I had done.

Dad was still trying to flush the heroin down the toilet when Lacy’s dad placed the handcuffs on his wrist.” They cuffed Mom too and she cried so hard that her body shook.

While they searched the house, Mom and Dad were on their knees in the living room.

“Elisabeth.” It’s a plea, but I’m not sure what he expects from me.

“Elisabeth is dead, Scott. Please stop calling me that.” I remember my father’s glare as Lacy’s dad walked me past them. I died to him in that moment. “Mom was put on probation.

Dad served six months. After he got out, he drove into Louisville to see me. He got down on his knees, looked me in the eye, and told me I was the worst thing that ever happened to him.” He stood. Faced my mother and asked if she was coming with him. Mom decided to stay with me. “And he left.”

And Mom didn’t leave, because she chose me. Even though she loved my father, she stayed. I owe her.

Scott turns the car back on. “I’m taking you home.”

“No!” I need to get an A in science. I need to see Ryan, go to his game, and know I’m making the right decision. I have a life here in Groveton and I need to be okay with letting my mom go. “I have a test today, then Ryan’s game after school. Let me do this.”

“If it’s what you want, fine. But we’re talking about this when you get home.”

Home. I have no idea what that word really means.

THE BELL RINGS as I slip into the building and I weave through the hallway filled with students. My own skin feels strange on my body. Almost like it’s too tight and needs to be shed. For years I focused on skipping class and today I fought to go to school. What is wrong with me?

A girl runs into my shoulder and laughs the moment she sees who she’s collided with.

“It’s her,” her friend loudly whispers.

The hair on the back of my neck stands on end. It’s me. What does that mean? I continue down the hallway and a group of guys stop talking and watch as I walk past. I clutch the science book as a shield. I didn’t even garner this much attention on my first day.

Screw them. I want to find Ryan and go to science. He won the writing competition and he has his last game this afternoon. I haven’t even properly congratulated him. I round the corner and stop the moment I spot a crowd of people near my locker.

An underclassman nods her head in my direction. “She’s here.”

The whispering and laughing cease and people distance themselves from me and my locker. Dread forces all hope to abandon my body. Written on my locker is the word I fear the most: whore.

Whore.

I slept with Ryan on Friday night.

Whore.

But he came to the hospital Saturday. He texted and called on Sunday, but I was too exhausted to call back. Ryan cares.

Whore.

I spin on my heel and try to escape down the hallway—away from my locker, away from the whispers and the laughter. I round a corner and slam into a friend of Gwen’s. “Well, look who it is—Beth Risk. Is it true you were arrested in Louisville?”

The only person I told about that was Ryan.

“Go to hell.”

Her friends laugh and she smiles. “Gwen tried to warn you. Ryan and his friends take dares very seriously. What made you think you were anything more than that?”

Ryan gave me a bottle of rain. He told me he loved me. He wouldn’t tell people that we slept together or that I was arrested in Louisville. He wouldn’t call me a whore. “I’m not a dare.”

“Really? Then how come Ryan’s parents didn’t know that you guys were dating? In fact, his mom told my mom that they forbade him to date you weeks ago.”

The ice pick straight to my heart leaves me speechless and I step back, but my retreat isn’t enough. She glances at her friends, then narrows her eyes at me. “Not only were you a dare, but you were Ryan’s dirty little secret.”

Ryan

I PARK THE JEEP behind Chris’s truck and hop out. I’ve got to find Beth and I need to find Gwen. I’ll hand Gwen homecoming. I’ll tell her that Beth and I will drop out, as long as Gwen keeps Beth’s secrets. Chris and Logan lean against the tailgate and smile when they notice me. Today could be a nightmare for Beth and I’m going to need their help. “Have you seen Beth?”

Both of them shake their heads.

“Have you seen Lacy?” asks Chris. “She was supposed to meet me here.”

I scan the parking lot and spot Lacy bolting out the side doors. “There she is.”

Chris straightens as he watches her hurry to us. “Something’s wrong.”

She bypasses Chris, reaches out, and slaps me across the face. The pain sucks, but the worst part is the tears streaming down Lacy’s face.

“How could you?” she chokes out.

Lacy’s never hit me before. She’s never hit anyone before.

Chris places himself between me and Lacy while Logan yells at the people loitering to witness the show to keep moving. “Lace, what the hell?” Chris says.

Lacy shoves Chris and the shoves turn frighteningly close to hitting. “What the hell?” she screams. “What the hell is wrong with you? You were supposed to be her friend.”

From behind her, Logan pulls her hands to her sides. “Slow it down, Lace. Tell us what’s wrong.”

Tears overflow from her eyes while she stares at me. “You promised me you wouldn’t hurt her. You promised she was no longer a dare.”

Beth. She means Beth. “She wasn’t. I mean, she was, but you know I called it off.”

She jerks her arms out of Logan’s grasp, but he stays near in case she decides to attack again. “Everyone is saying Chris and Logan dared you to sleep with her. They said you won when you took Beth into the woods during the last field party. They said you slept with her and that she told you about her past. Everyone knows what happened to her in Louisville. Everyone knows.”

Gwen. I smack my fist into the side of Chris’s truck. “Have you seen Beth?”

Lacy shakes her head. “Tell me you didn’t do it. Please.”

Chris hesitantly touches her cheek. “No, baby. The dare ended the night Ryan fell for her.”

She wipes the tears from her face. “Someone wrote whore on her locker.”

Logan runs both hands over his face while Chris swears. The nightmare has already begun.

I SEARCH THE HALLWAYS for Beth and I come up empty. The first warning bell rings and from the opposite end of the hallway Lacy shakes her head. Dammit. They can’t find her either. Logan taps my shoulder. “She just walked into class.”

Finally. I take off down the hallway and step into class right when the tardy bell rings. Lacy, Chris, and Logan trail behind me. Chris claps my back and the three of them head for our seats. Someone shushes the whispering and laughing as everyone watches me. I study

Beth. She’s reclaimed the seat in the corner of the room instead of the one she took next to me weeks ago.

Just like the first day of school, Beth’s hair hides her face and she doodles in her notebook.

My ribbon no longer graces her wrist.

An adult I don’t know clears her throat. We must have a sub today. “Do you mind taking your seat?”

Beth glances up at me, then immediately looks back down. It’s as if I swallowed knives.

She’s heard the rumors and she believes them.

Perfection. It’s what everyone expects from me. Take my seat. Do my work. Go to practice.

Play ball. Keep everything bottled up and let your insides rot as long as the outside looks perfect. “Beth.”

She keeps her head down and the substitute steps into my line of view. “Either find a seat or find yourself in detention this afternoon.”

“Ryan,” Chris says. “The game.”

The game against Northside. I promised Chris I wouldn’t miss another game and detention would bar me from keeping that promise. Reluctantly, I take my seat and turn to stare at Beth, willing her to look at me.

“We’ll catch her after class,” Chris whispers to me from across the aisle.

THE BELL RINGS and it’s a race of who can get out of their seat faster. Beth is out the door first and her size makes it possible for her to duck and weave through the mass of bodies crowding the hallway. My next class is in the opposite direction of where she’s headed, but I don’t care.

She runs down the history hallway and I grab her arm right before she enters the safety of the classroom. I lean in and look straight into her eyes. “You know I love you.”

Her eyes search my face and she appears as broken as she did two days ago at the hospital.

“Did you fuck me to win a dare?”

I fight the urge to shake her. “I didn’t fuck you, I made love to you. Don’t do this, Beth.

Don’t take what was beautiful between us and make it ugly.”

Water fills her eyes and my heart slices into a million pieces. Beth isn’t a crier and I’m making her cry. I thought making love would prove how much I loved her. Prove that she could trust me, and it’s killing me to know that one act could be what’s tearing us apart. “I gave you my word that the dare was over.

When have I ever lied to you?”

“On the front steps of Scott’s house you promised me I wouldn’t be a secret.”

I’m standing here breaking the PDA rules by holding her close to me. How can she believe I lied? “I’ve told everyone at school. I’ve brought you to games. I’ve taken you to parties.”