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needed to drive. Think.”
    “Little fight or big fight?”
    He pulls into my new driveway, shifts into park before pinning me with a hard look. “There was no blood. Or broken windows.”
    “So not a real fight at all.”
    His lips twitch, but he doesn’t smile. “No, not a real fight. It’s no big deal. We’ll be cool by tomorrow. I can’t afford
not
to be cool with her. She’s the only other person I know at SHS. You gotta have friends, right?”
    “I don’t have many,” I say, distracted by the light in the kitchen and the music drifting through the open window. Melanie is waiting up for her daughter, probably wanting to know all the details about her date. Wonderful. I smooth my hair away from my face and pray I’ve gotten enough of the blood off.
    “That’s weird.”
    “What’s weird?”
    “That you don’t have many friends. You seem socially functional.”
    “Oh, I guess … I’m … just …”
    I’m not Ariel. I’m an imposter, a girl from seven hundred years ago who’s a little less damaged than this girl with the scarred face
.
    But only a little
.
    “You’re just what?” he asks.
    “Shy.”
    He smiles his real smile, the crooked one that is somehow more beautiful for its imperfection. “You don’t seem shy. At all.”
    He’s right. And Ariel isn’t really shy; she’s just … broken.I’ll have to work harder at impersonating her. The fact that she’s never met Ben lulled me into relaxing my guard. I have to be more careful. Small, subtle changes in conduct that add up to a better life for her are the best way to get my job done without arousing concern about out-of-character behavior. I should know better than to let my own personality show too much.
    I should know better than to make any of the mistakes I’ve made since jumping into this car.
    “Well …” I shrug. “I guess the way we met broke the ice.”
    “Carjacking. Perfect icebreaker.”
    “Yeah. After that, shy seemed silly.”
    “I’m glad.” Ben leans into the backseat again, grabs a wrinkled black sweatshirt, and presses it into my hands. “Here, this is a little stinky, but you should put it on. You’ve got blood on your shirt.” He leans closer, the concerned look creeping back onto his face. “A … 
lot
of blood. Are you sure you’re okay?” His fingers reach out, whispering along my shoulder, making me flinch. Because it hurts even more now. His gentleness.
    His eyebrows draw together, but he doesn’t pull his hand away. “I’m not going to hurt you.”
    “I know,” I whisper. Hurting me isn’t what I’m worried about. At least, not in the way he means. He can’t know that his care is the thing that hurts, the thing that makes something deep inside me cry out in a way it hasn’t since I was real, since I was a girl with her own body and life and a sadness that felt bigger than the world.
    “And I won’t let anyone else hurt you either. I promise.” His fingers drift to my cheek.
    I know I should move away, reach for the door handle, get out of here before this moment gets any thicker, but I can’t.For some reason … I
can’t
. I am lost in him, in the passion in his eyes, the softness of his touch, the conviction in his words.
    “I have to go,” I say, but I don’t move. He doesn’t either. He just stares at me, his eyes flicking from my lips to my eyes and back again.
    “Then go,” he says, as he leans closer.
    “Okay.”
    Go, Juliet. Move! Now!
    But I don’t. I stay and let him come closer, closer, until I can feel the heat of his lips and imagine just how perfect they’ll feel, how perfect he’ll taste, how—
    “Thanks for the shirt.” I break the moment, lunge for the door handle, and half fall out of the car. My heart is pounding so hard it leaps in my throat as I pull the shirt over my head, hiding the evidence of how badly I’ve been hurt before bending back down to face Ben through the open window. “I’ll see you tomorrow. Maybe we’ll have some