Twenty-seven.

Since Madison Bell and I had started dating - a word high schoolers used to mean “kissing a lot” - I’d gotten used to touching her. Playing with her hair had always been easy, but now I could take her hand without asking. I could draw pictures with my finger on her thigh when we were sitting together on the couch. I could leave lip prints in pink gloss on her neck. Sometimes she would still flinch, but each day it seemed less and less.

Her kissing had gotten a lot better, and I’d gotten a lot better at doing it. I knew how hard to push against her, when to part my lips, and how to lick the tip of her tongue. And she knew how to make these cute little sounds that made me want to devour every part of her in the absolute best way. When we’d stop, when our lips would drift away from one another, her glasses were always a half a centimeter too far down her nose and her eyes were glossy and bright with possibility. So many possibilities.

I was dating Madison Bell. I had to say that a few times every now and again, just to remind myself. This was actually real.

“About damn time,” Polly said.

“You could at least act surprised,” I pouted. Pouted? Ugh, Madison was rubbing off on me.

“I am the literal opposite of surprised. I am like, staring into the camera on The Office.” I sat down next to Polly on my sofa. She didn’t look up from the TV. Charmed reruns were on.

“What about you and Tom?” I asked.

“History.”

“Sorry.”

“It’s cool.”

I played with the bracelet on my wrist, the string bracelet Madison had made me for Christmas. It was starting to lose its vibrance - I never took it off, even to shower. It was hard not to think about her. I was so hopeless.

“So,” Polly went on, “you love her?”

“As much as any sixteen year old can, I guess.”

“And the kid stuff?”

“I love that too. It’s cute.”

“And her Dark Days?”

“I love that I can be there and help her. Or at least, you know. Try.”

“You sound like her, you know.”

“Huh?”

A commercial came on and Polly finally turned to me, pulling her legs up onto the sofa so she could face me properly. She looked tired, like she needed a nap, but her smile was crooked and sharp and remarkably her.

“You want to help, and you want to be there. You want to find all the bright parts of things. And that’s just… not like you, Jamie.”

It wasn’t?

“Listen,” she went on, “sixteen or not, I think this is a real thing. Anybody that can make you smile like that is worth keeping around.”

“Thanks?”

“You’re welcome.” But before Charmed came back on, Polly had another question for me. “How are the nightmares?”

I groaned.

“Have you thought about seeing a therapist?” she asked.

“No.”

“Talking to your mom?”

“No.”

“What about Madison?”

I shrugged my shoulders. “I have you. Why do I need someone else?”

“I would have said the same thing four months ago,” Polly laughed and stuck out her tongue. But then the commercials ended and we didn’t talk about it again.

Biology went as routinely as always. I was never alone in the Writing Workshop at lunch time anymore. My favorite days were the ones when Polly and Madison could both pull themselves away from social obligations. Madison and I held hands under the tables. I always caught her stealing glances at me around the frames of her glasses and never through them.

But one thing bothered me. It was Monday in late March and my birthday was a few days away. That meant Madison was still older than me, and that sort of thing was very important to her. She wasn’t in the best mood. We were walking through Walmart with our hands laced together, and then suddenly, we weren’t.

“Madison?”

“Oh, hey Remy! How are you doing?”

“Great, just picking up some prescriptions for my mom. I never expected to see you in a Walmart.”

I stood awkwardly to the side, since I had no idea who this girl was. She must have gone to our school, right?

“Oh but they have such cool stuff here,” Madison chimed, rocking back on her heels. “They have awesome pajamas and Jamie and I always get bread from the bakery.”

Remy stared at me. I waved.

“Oh, well. It was nice seeing you. Have fun shopping!”

Remy left and I watched Madison deflate. Her shoulders fell. A breath went through her lips a little too fast. She reached for my hand again and I let her take it.

“Why do you do that?” I asked her.

“Do what?”

“Still act like that. Like you’re okay when you’re not.”

She shrugged. “I don’t want to worry anybody.”

“Then why did you let go of my hand?”

Madison blinked. Like maybe she hadn’t noticed. Or maybe she hadn’t noticed that I noticed. I held up our hands between us, so she could see our palms pushed together.

“Right when you saw her, you let go. And when she left, you grabbed my hand again.”

She stared at me for a moment, and then she averted her eyes to her shoes. Oh…

“You’re ashamed of me?” My hand tightened in hers. That was the opposite of what I’d wanted to do. I wanted to take my hand out of hers altogether. But I was hurt. I was scared…

“No!” Madison yelled, looking up at me again. Her eyebrows were pushed together in frustration, her lips moving ever-so slightly. She wanted to find the right words. “I’m… I just want…”

“What? Me?”

“Of course you!”

“Then why would you—”

“Because I just want everybody to like me!” she admitted. “I don’t want to upset anybody and I want to have friends and I don’t want to feel like I used to, and I don’t want my mom to worry about me not having friends, and I just—”

I held her by the shoulders and shut her up with a kiss on her lips. Tears welled up in her eyes. I kept my lips on hers until they stopped. When I pulled away, her glasses were too low on her nose.

“Madison. You won’t be alone. I’m here. I said I would take care of you, remember?”

“But—”

“Do you know why I didn’t like you when we were kids? Why you annoyed me so much for all those years? You were never honest with me. I never knew how you really felt. You never told anyone. And I didn’t take the time to figure you out, not until a few months ago. But I always knew I couldn’t trust you.”

I thought she might cry again.

“And now?” I went on. “Now you tell me when you’re upset, you let me help. You share so much with me. And I love you for it. Anybody who cares - really cares, who wants to care - can see through this act. But not everyone can force their way in. Sometimes you have to let people in, too.”

“What if they don’t like me?” she asked, looking up at me with wet eyes.

“I can’t imagine that.”

“What if they worry about me?”

“If you let them worry about you, maybe they will let you worry about them too. You know that girl in Biology? Claire? She’s your friend, isn’t she?”

Madison nodded.

“Her parents are getting a divorce. Polly told me.”

This was obviously news to Madison. “They are?”

“They are. And I bet she didn’t tell you because she didn’t want you to worry.”

Madison held onto my shirt and looked down at her shoes. In honesty, I think I was bringing her world down around her. So I pulled her against my chest and kissed her on the forehead.

“What if I annoy everyone with my problems?” Madison mumbled into my shoulder. “I don’t want to annoy anybody…”

“You annoy me all the time,” I told her. “Honestly, you get upset about the stupidest things, and you handle everything in the worst way. You’re so dramatic and selfless and naive. And you hate birthdays - who even hates birthdays? But all those things are you. Every feeling you have is yours. And if I thought your feelings were less important than how they make me feel, then I wouldn’t be a very good friend. I wouldn’t be a very good girlfriend…”

I kissed her hair and closed my eyes, holding her as tight as I could in the makeup aisle at Walmart. She really was annoying, wasn’t she?

“Annoy me forever, Madison Bell.”

I felt her head nod against my shoulder.