"Are y'all sure y'all don't wanna go to Disney World?" Blossom says for the umpteenth time.

A groan passes around the table, and I divert my attention to my phone. Chloe's sent me a photo of a cat pawing at her office window, begging to be let in. I'm not really a cat person, but I pretend it's cute, for her.

Nate: Aren't you on the sixth floor?

Chloe: We are!!!! I don't know how it got up here but I'm gonna save it. Wish me luck <3

Nate: good luck :)

"Nate! Stop looking at your phone and focus." Candela says, touching my shoulder.

I lock my screen and look up, making eye contact with Kel. He nods his head in the direction of Candela's hand, which is still on my shoulder and I ignore him in favour of my turkey sandwich. Whatever he's implying is wrong.

"Sorry. What were we talking about?" I ask after a big bite.

"Still planning our summer." Blossom says, pouting. They probably shot down her Disney World suggestion again.

"Do we have to do anything?" I ask her. Everyone turns their head to stare at me and I shrink, knowing I should've just kept my mouth shut.

"Uh, duh?" Halley says finally. "It's our last chance to do things all together! You and Kel are leaving."

I swallow another bite of my sandwich. "Have a pool party."

"We're already doing that." Candela looks at her calendar. "July eighteenth."

"A barbeque?"

"We're having four of those."

"Seniors only beach party?"

Candela shakes her head in disappointment. "It's like you're not even trying."

"What do you want from me?" I ask, exasperated.

They ignore me and go back to their conversation. Blossom at least spares a sympathetic look in my direction, but I just look around the cafeteria, wondering where Hannah is. Our lunch period started five minutes ago, and it's already packed in here. I can't see her, but I'm kinda worried that she's flaked out on me.But as it turns out, I don't need to be. Because while I'm looking for her, Hannah pops up in my line of vision, holding a blue lunch bag and a carton of orange juice.

"Hey." She says, her smile reaching her bright black eyes. "This the lunch table?"

"Yeah, hey!" I say, waving awkwardly. "Come sit."

She waits as I shuffle over, creating space between Candela and I. I'm aware of the fact my friends are deadly silent around the table, all talk of summer coming to a mute. Hannah slips into me, opening her lunch bag.

"Uh, guys, this is my friend Hannah." I introduce. "We met at prom."

Kel immediately starts smirking as he reaches over the table with his hand outstretched. "I'm Kellan Hargrove. Welcome to our humble table, feel free to steal from Nate's endless supply of fruit."

Hannah grins and looks at the abundance of fruit in front of me. "It's nice to meet you." She says.

One by one, everyone introduces themselves, big smiles on all their faces and I'm suddenly really proud of my friends for being so welcoming. It even turns out Hannah and Halley are even in the same chemistry class, so they bond over a stink bomb someone let off as a senior prank a few days ago. Once everyone's talking, I relax, not realising how tense I was feeling."So, what brings you to sit with us today?" Candela asks. She's being a lot nicer today than she was at prom a few days ago. I wonder what changed.

"Nate invited me this morning." She says. "And he was really chill when he taught me this dance at prom, so I thought why not?"

"A dance? You can dance?" Kel says to me.

"You know I can, dude." I shake my head. "I used to beat you on Just Dance on the daily."

"I let you win!"

"Letting me win every single game we played is not letting me win. It's called losing." I say.

Hannah starts to giggle, then Halley laughs and Kel looks at her like she's betrayed him. The remnants of the awkward air that descended when Hannah sat seems to fade and my friends start talking about summer again. I take another bite of my sandwich then glance at my phone, still waiting on Chloe's next reply. This cat wrangling thing must be more serious than I thought.

Hannah taps me on my arm gently. "What's going on?" She asks, and I realise I'm being a bad host.

"Everyone's planning what to do for the summer." I explain and she nods. "I think we're having a pool party? And Disney World?"

"We are not going to Disney World!" Candela snaps.

"What's wrong with Disney World?" Hannah asks. "I've never been."

"It's too..." Candela crinkles her nose up and tries to think of the word. "Childish."

"Well shoot, last I checked I was still a child." She replies. "I kinda wanna go."

"You really want to?" Blossom has literal tears in her eyes. "I'm free next week?"

Hannah laughs. "I'm down if you are."

Blossom squeals loudly and then hops out of her seat to come and hug Hannah tightly. I grin, then my phone vibrates with a photo message and my hands get all clammy. Chloe's sent me a photo of a really small cat perched on her desk, with a thumb's up. It's enough for me to maintain my smile, and I send her some cheering emojis.

Chloe: Can I call you this evening or are you working?

Nate: I've got the afternoon off but before seven? I gotta go to the gym

Chloe: Gym? You make me sick

Chloe: LOL but seriously, I'll speak to you then! <3I'm gonna persuade my boss to let us keep the cat until I can get it home!

We talk and eat until the bell rings, signalling the end of our last lunch of high school. There's a buzz in the air as we walk to our classes, talking and laughing loudly about the approaching summer, and I can feel the excitement wash over me like a wave.

"Okay, Hannah, now if you had to choose between Stitch and Bolt, who'd you pick?" Blossom asks, clearly overjoyed at the prospect of going to Disney next week.

"Stitch, no contest." She answers. I didn't think it was possible, but Blossom gets even more overjoyed.

I share a smile with Hannah as my friends head to their classes. Once again, we're in the same hallway, which means I've passed her hundreds of times without realising. Kinda crazy.

"You're pretty cool, you know that right?" I tell her.

"Yeah, I know." She says. "But it's nice to be reminded, so thanks I guess."

I roll my eyes. "Okay, cool and definitely not humble. Remind me never to compliment you again."

"I am so not reminding you that." Hannah laughs. "Lunch was fun by the way. Your friends are interesting, even the one that's clearly in love with you."

"I don't know what you're talking about." I say, knowing she's talking about Candela. A part of me wants to deny it, but she's been acting weird clingy all day. So now I'm really considering it to be a possibility and I don't know what to do.

"Mhm, course you don't." She says, and stops by her class. I lean against the wall next to the door. There's still time before our class, so I can hang out.

"So I've got Literature class right now. You?" She says.

I gesture towards my classroom. "World History. My last assignment's due."

She shakes her head, annoyed all of a sudden. "It's so dumb they're making us do work on the last day of school! It's so stupid, what do they want from us when the sun's already frazzling our brain? Like, at my old school, for the whole of the last week we'd just goof off and eat snacks, but here, they actually want things from us and it's so... dumb!"

I stare at her for a moment and I swear her cheeks go a little red. "That was a really passionate speech, Hannah."

"Oh my goodness, don't even."

"No, really. You're blushing, and it's getting kind of warm 'round here." I fan my face and laugh as she rolls her eyes. "I guess that pretty much debunks the theory that black people can't blush. Thanks for helping science."

"Since when were you into science, swimmer boy?"

"Hey, I've got interests other than water!" I mock being offended. Her next eye roll is almost comical. "And plus, you're still blushing, so I guess swimmer boy's got a great hypothesis."

She shakes her head at me, but she's smiling. "Guess you've already got your senior thesis for college sorted out, huh?"

"Exactly. I'm gonna call it 'The Dynamics of Blushing: Melanin and Me.'" I smile at her and then straighten up. "I should let you go to class."

"Yeah, you should." She says. "Stop terrorising me with science."

I stick my tongue out.

Hannah laughs. "Or don't, I guess? I'll see you around?"

"Yeah, see you." I say. I start to leave but then she touches my arm, stopping me. "What's up?"

"I don't have your number." She says, getting her phone out of her pocket. "Or like, your socials, at least."

"Oh, right." I tell her, handing her my phone. She taps in her number quickly and I do the same in hers. "We should hang out this summer. You free?"

"For most of it, yeah. I'll text you."

"Not if I text you first!" I say in an over the top voice. Hannah stares at me and I feel the heat creeping up my face, settling in my cheeks as I look away from her and clear my throat. "I'm gonna go."

"You absolutely should." She says and then laughs. "And by the way, you also debunk your whole 'black people don't blush' thing, you know that?"

"Whatever, Hannah!" I say as I cross the hallway. Her laugh follows me all the way into my classroom.

☼ ☼ ☼

"So, I'm running for my train in the middle of New York City and guess what happens?"

"You fall on your ass?" I guess. Chloe laughs.

"No, even worse: my heel breaks!" She says. I gasp "And instead of falling on my ass, I fall onto some old businessman! And he thinks it's the perfect opportunity to hit on me and asks me on a date!"

"Ew – wait, did you say yes?"

"Gross, Nate, of course I didn't, he was like seventy!" She giggles. "I did hobble away from him as fast as my one heel would allow me though. I got to work on time and my boss thought out I was trying a new one heeled style that went awry, so I guess it worked out fine. "I shake my head, smiling.

"You're so silly sometimes. Did you at least get your heel fixed?"

"The shoe is lost forever." She sighs. "Anyway, I'm talking way too much!How was your last day of school? When's your graduation ceremony again?"

"It was good. I made a new friend today." I say. "And the ceremony's on Saturday. You wanna come?"

"Oh yeah, I'll fly a red eye on Friday just to see your graduation."

"It's the least you could do." I joke and she laughs.

"In all serious, I wish I could be there." She says. "So, who's your new friend? Is he cool?"

"Actually, it's a she." I correct . "Her name's Hannah, she's from San Francisco."

"Oh, a girl?" Chloe says. "That's cool. I guess."

"It is. She is, I mean. She's really nice too, and she's got this wicked sense of humour. I wish I met her a long time ago, we'd probably be really great friends already. I think you'd like her, too." Chloe's gone quiet. I realise I've been rambling and rub the back of my head. "Chlo, you still there?"

"Sorry, yeah, I was listening." She says. Her voice sounds off. "She sounds cool. Is she pretty?"

"Yeah, she's pretty."

"Oh wow."

"You know I only befriend pretty people, Chlo." I say, not liking how wow-less that wow sounded. "That's why you've been around me for so long."

The compliment works. "Aw, shucks, Nate, stop, you're gonna make me blush."

"It's easy making you blush."

She says something in hushed Portuguese and giggles. It's too fast for me attempt to translate, so I don't even try. We start talking again, and I tell her about my summer plans and other things, sinking into conversation until I have to get going to the gym for weight training. When I tell her I gotta go, she sighs.

"Gosh, Nate. I really miss you." She mumbles.

"I miss you too." I say back. "It'd be nice if you were here, but I get you have to work."

She sighs again. "Yeah. Stupid work. We should be having the summer of our lives this year. Remember when I vowed to take you on an adventure one summer?"

"I remember." I say quietly.

"I wish you could come up to New York right now so we could hang out."

"It could be arranged." I say, only half serious. "It's summer, I could drive to New York and be there in two days."

"Would you actually come up here?"

"I mean..." I shrug, trying to figure out my words. "If my mom would let me. You know how she is."

"Yeah, I do." She says, sighing. "Well, anyway, I should let you go. Enjoy lifting!"

"It won't be easy." I say and she laughs. "Bye, Chlo."

She hangs up on me and I get myself ready, picking up my gym bag and getting my car keys. My mom's not home yet, but she should be in the time I'm away. On the way out of the door, I get an apple and a banana to snack on the drive. I open the front door, whistling.

And then my brain pretty much goes kaput.

"Hey Nathaniel." Reese says.

"What?" I just about manage to respond. The corners of his lips turn up into the easygoing sarcastic smile I'm so used to seeing on his face.

"Wanna go for a drive?"

A/N:

Reese is here! What do you guys think will happen on the drive?!

I can't believe I've updated on a Tuesday three weeks in a row omg y'all better hope that writers block doesn't beat my ass and make me disappear in a few weeks and I get this story done !!!!!!