When we get home, Grams goes upstairs to take a nap after making me a cup of Earl Gray and tucking me under a blanket on the couch. I watch part of an old black and white movie without actually registering any of the plot. I'm just about to turn off the television when there's a knock on the door.

I sigh, heave myself to my feet, and trudge my way to the door.

When I pull open the door, I find Abbott standing on my front porch.

"Hi," I say, surprised.

"Hey. I just wanted to see how you're doing."

"I'm fine," I say, the words falling automatically out of my mouth. "Just watching a little TV."

"Oh, yeah? What?"

My mouth opens, but I realize that I can't answer the question because I don't even really know. "Um, I'm not sure." It makes me laugh. The act feels strange. It's been a while since I laughed.

"Well, do you want some company watching... whatever it is that you're watching?" Abbott asks shyly.

"Sure," I say, and I open the door a little wider. He follows me inside, and I close the door gently behind him. "Would you like some tea?" I ask.

"No, thanks. I'm good."

I shrug and walk into the living room, where on the television a commercial for a steam mop is segueing back into the movie. I take a seat on one side of the couch, grab a throw pillow, and press it against my chest.

"Oh, I know this one," Abbott says. "Casablanca. My mom used to watch this whenever she had a bad day. I've never watched it the whole way through."

"I'm not really sure what's going on," I admit. "I was kind of spacing out."

Abbott takes off his jacket, folds it neatly and hangs it over the arm of the couch, and takes a seat opposite from me. "Well, I know enough about the plot to fill you in." He points. "See, it's during World War II. And that guy... Rick... he's the owner of this bar, and secretly he helps fugitives to get to safety. But then there's this whole romantic plot—my mom's favorite part, of course—between him and his ex, who's married to someone else who happens to need some documents to get out of the country. Which Rick has. Make sense?"

I wrinkle my brow. "Yeah. So... that's his ex?" I point at an actress onscreen, a woman with a cloud of soft curls framing her face.

"Yeah... Ilsa. Played by Ingrid Bergman."

I turn to Abbott, my eyebrows raised. "You know a lot about old movies."

He shakes his head. "Not that much. Just the ones I watched with my mom when I was little. She likes old movies the best. She says they have so much more soul than today's films. I made her watch Fast and the Furious one night, and she couldn't even make it halfway through."

I giggle. "Well, to be fair..."

Abbott smiles. "Yeah. Maybe I should have picked something better."

We are quiet for a while, just watching the movie. When it gets to the end, the part when Rick and Ilsa are saying goodbye by the airplane, it seems so familiar, like déjà vu. Maybe I have seen it before. Rick tells Ilsa that the problems of three people are so much smaller than what's going on in the rest of the world.

I don't know what it is, but that line snags something inside of me, won't let me go. I'm not sure I can untangle the thread, the full meaning of it, but it has something to do with me and Mrs. Edwards and maybe my mom.

By the time the credits roll, I realize that I am silently crying.

Abbott touches my hand. "Are you okay?" he asks.

"Yeah," I wiping away tears with the back of my hand. "I don't know why I'm crying. I guess I'm just emotional right now."

"That's understandable."

"I just... everything seems so overwhelming right now. It's like there's too much going on for me to process. It takes every ounce of energy I have just to get dressed, to eat."

Abbott leans forward. "Look, Lil, I know this is hard. Probably the hardest thing you'll ever go through. But you can get through this. I know you." He looks at me intently.

A needle of resentment stings me. I know that Abbott means well, but honestly, we haven't spent all that much time together. Alone, at least. It's not like he knows who I am underneath the mask I wear every day. "Look, no offense, but you don't really know anything about me."

He pulls his hand back. "I probably know more about you than you think."

"Oh, yeah?" It is my turn to stare at him challengingly.

His voice is very, very quiet. "I know that you hurt yourself. I mean, before the suicide thing. You have for years. You try to hide it, but it's kind of hard to keep it secret when we're playing in a hot garage during the dog days of summer. We've all seen the scars."

I clutch my arm protectively over my chest. "Yeah, well—"

He doesn't let me finish. "I know that something happened to you when you were little, but you never talk about it with anyone, not even Riley."

I tuck my legs under myself, hug the pillow to me tightly.

Close my eyes.

I didn't think his voice could go any softer, but it does. He speaks so quietly, but to me it feels like he's shouting. "Tell me about it, Lil."

I start to rock.

Back and forth and back again.

"Please. Tell me."

The air in the room seems to have thickened. I find myself fighting for each breath. My heart slams against my ribcage.

"Lil?"

He reaches out and tries to loosen my right hand from the tight ball it has become. His fingers are warm, insistent. I yank my hand away from him.

My eyes fly open.

"It's not that easy."

"What isn't?"

"Opening up," I say angrily. "It's just not that easy. You don't spend your whole life worrying that other people are going to find out what happened to you and then just all of a sudden decide to spill your secrets. It doesn't work that way. This isn't some fairy tale, and you aren't my white knight. Understand?"

He winces, pulls away from me and sits on the edge of the couch, his elbows propped on his knees.

My mind is wandering to sharp things. I wonder if Grams had a chance to Lil-proof the house. Maybe, if I get rid of Abbott, I can go through the drawers before she wakes up. Just a little release. Just a tiny cut. Sweat prickles under my arms. I want to scream at Abbott to just go.

"I already know what happened, Lil."

My heart stops.

He runs his fingers through his hair, looking frustrated. "I already know. My dad gets files on every kid that goes through our school, especially the ones with complicated histories. When he found out that I was playing music with you guys, he got worried, thought I was hanging out with the wrong kind of people. He told me about... what happened to you."

There are a million questions running through my mind.

"You knew?" I sputter. "All along?"

"How your mom tried to drown you when you were just a baby? And your grandmother walked in and saved you? Yeah, I've known for a few years. I kept hoping you would get comfortable enough to tell us about your past. I don't know why you keep it to yourself. You know it's not your fault, right? What your mother did—that wasn't even about you."

I stare at him, this boy sitting a foot away from me who knows my deepest secret and has been pretending he didn't for, like, years. And now he's trying to psychoanalyze me and fix something that's been broken in me since before I knew how to read?

Fuck that shit.

"Get out of my house," I shout through my tears.

He shakes his head sadly. "Lil. Don't do this."

"Out!"

He stands but doesn't take a step toward the door. "You know, my dad has been wrong about a lot of things in his life. But I think his worst mistake was taking one look at your file and writing you off as some messed up girl. Do you remember the first time we met?"

I bury my face.

He goes on. "We were freshmen. It was after school, and I was waiting for my dad to get stuff done so I could catch a ride home with him. But he got a call that there was a fight in the south hallway. I followed him to see what was going on, but there wasn't a fight at all. It was these seniors who had this little kid cornered, and they had his crutches and were passing them around. And there you were, yelling at the biggest kid, calling him a fucking asshole and telling him to give the crutches back. You got detention for that. Remember?"

The memory is like a faded picture, but it is familiar. I find myself nodding through my tears. Abbott comes closer and kneels by the couch. Despite myself, I take my hand away from my face and look into his eyes. He is only inches away now, and I want to reach out and touch him, but I don't dare.

And then Grams is standing there, hair all crazy, confusion in her eyes. "Lil? I heard you call out. What's going on in here?"

Abbott is on his feet again.

I try to explain. "Abbott came by to see how I was doing."

"I was just leaving, ma'am," Abbott says. "Sorry for disturbing you. I'll see you tomorrow, Lil." He throws me one last look and then walks out the door, leaving me a bewildered mess.

"Are you okay, Lil?" Grams sits on the couch next to me.

I take inventory of my feelings.

There are so many things I am right now. Sad, pissed off, lonely, tired. Underneath it all, I realize, there's something else. Maybe... gratitude? That Abbott came over at all, that he somehow looked past my exterior and saw something worthwhile underneath? That he tried to reach out?

Maybe gratitude is what I need to hold onto right now.

"Yeah," I tell Grams. "I think I'm okay."