Page 5 of The Art of Us

That loss cut into his heart.

Which meant he was haunted too. He knew he needed to move forward in his life, but moving forward was not the same thing as getting over it.

He hadn’t gotten over anything.

But he was trying to move forward.

Moving forward was psychological first aid.

That’s what his dad said, anyway.

His dad felt sympathy for his broken heart, but his mom was the one who felt the empathy. They encouraged him in his painting. They encouraged him to join the band, Shadow Dimension, when the band was looking for someone who could really sing. His parents had all but demanded he try out for the gig at Geppetto’s when they were holding tryouts for Friday night entertainment, even if it only paid in pizza and a bit of pocket change for each band member.

His dad liked the way that particular extracurricular looked on a college application.

His mom liked that it fed his soul.

It didn’t at first. No talent can make up for the terror of stage fright. When he first got up on the little stage at the side of the old-fashioned pizza parlor, his first instinct was to duck and hide. He was too out in the open, too visible. His vision narrowed and he almost fell off the stage and passed out. But he saw his mom looking panicked and his dad nodding his head and mouthing the first few words to the cover he was doing, and he was able to sing. The music took the edge off the fear and almost made him forget that he was in front of a crowd.

He sent the video clip his mom had taken of him onstage with his new band to Brell. She didn’t respond, and it felt like she’d stomped on his heart all over again. He even got mad at her. But then he got the news that she was gone. Gone because of one of her so-called new friends because they were young and drunk and stupid.

Could he have stopped it if he hadn’t left Arizona? Could he have stopped it if he had called every day in the beginning after he’d moved? Maybe. Maybe not.

Since he’d first noticed Ireland Raine stealing remnants ofother people’s dinners, it had taken his mind off of everything in a way that even his music or art hadn’t. She had given him a new focus, one that helped him to forget that the person he’d thought washisperson didn’t think he was worth even a text message.

He supposed that was why he invited Ireland to dinner. She clearly needed food for some reason, and it was within his power to feed her as much as she could handle eating—at least on Fridays.

Brell had loved pizza. She didn’t care what toppings were on it. She didn’t care if it had been left out all night or even if it smelled a little off. How many times had he warned her that she was going to die of food poisoning?

Ireland is not Brell.

And Brell didn’t die from being poisoned.

I’m spiraling.

Kal needed to pull himself out of the whirlpool of his thoughts. He reminded himself several more times that Ireland was not Brell before class was over. He expected Ireland to talk to him after class. Maybe they’d walk out together, hang out in the halls for a minute. But she ditched fast, with nothing more than a strained smile and a nod.

Weird.

Or “oddball,” as Brell would say.

Stop it.

He shook his head and went to his next class.

Art.

He was a little sad that he didn’t have this class with Ireland. He really did like her style. She was good—really good. She deserved to be in the advanced art class. He couldn’t figure out why someone with as much raw talent as she had was taking a beginners’ course.

It didn’t make sense.

“Hey, Wasden.”

The art instructor looked up from where he had been tacking up blank white posters at the front of the room.

“What’s up, Kal?” Mr. Wasden replied.

“Just living the dream, man.”Or living the nightmare. Over and over and over and over and over—stop.

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