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girly thing to wonder about. My brother said that I must’ve inherited my mother’s girly gene when she died.
    “You sound like the counselor at my last school.”
    Knowing an opportunity to find out more information when I heard one, I jumped on it. “Where was your last school?” Olivia turned and tapped her finger on my snare. “A little boarding school in Colorado.” That surprised me. The Cartwrights weren’t rich, and boarding schools seemed like they were for the wealthy. “Real y?”
    “Yeah,” she said with a sigh. “I wasn’t there for long.”
    “What was it like?”
    She rol ed her eyes. “Stuffy. It had horses and a lake.”
    I’d never been to boarding school, but the fact that those two things were what she told me about struck me as odd. “You don’t like horses and lakes?”
    “I like horses, but the school was like . . .” She paused for a long moment and then shrugged. “It was like a therapeutic school. They used the horses to help troubled kids bond with something or whatever.”
    I cocked my head to the side. She wasn’t looking at me now. Olivia tucked her hair behind her ears and busied herself with drumsticks and mal ets.
    A therapeutic boarding school. Troubled kids. She didn’t seem like a troubled kid who needed therapy. She seemed wel -adjusted and happy.
    Wel , at the moment, she looked lost in thought. Not happy, but not overly sad either.
    It struck me that I knew so very little about her.
    “So what about rock’ n’ rol , man?”
    Her voice was brighter than just moments before and the strange juxtaposition confused me for a second. Then my focus narrowed back onto her words, but I was stil confused. “Huh?”
    “You have al these drums for marching band, right? So what about rock’ n’ rol ? Do you have a set for rocking out?” I liked the way she spoke. There was no struggle for words. There was no awkward cadence or hesitation. She just spoke.
    “My kit’s in the garage,” I said.
    She tapped a drumstick against my Dune poster. “So you do play some rock?”
    “Of course.” I was defensive. She had no way of knowing that I played, so the question wasn’t out of line, but the tone bothered me. “I’m not just some guy that’s good at history and marching band.”
    She turned, craning her head in my direction, causing her hair to whip around. It made a ‘ppppfftt’ sound as it hit the poster on the wal . At first her expression was neutral, but then, slowly, a mirthful expression seemed to blossom. Lips upturned, eyes twinkling, she said, “You have fire in you.” With a nod, she added, “I like it.”
    I had to look away from her not knowing what she meant. It took a moment, but I final y cleared my throat, and attempted to shift the topic back to tutoring. “I real y need to look at your notes in order to help you with history.” I was stil looking at my carpet when I heard her set the sticks down on my snare. There was a quiet thud on my bed, accompanied by the squeaks of the springs. Glancing up, she was lying on her stomach, her feet up in the air, crossed at the ankle, her head resting on its side on top of her folded arms. “Okay.”
    I motioned toward the window. “Do you want to go and get them?”
    She sat up, and looked me in the eyes. “Can I ask you something?”
    I nodded.
    “What’s the point of studying history? I don’t get it.”
    How could she not know? Had we not just had this conversation? She was smart—even if she needed a little help, I could tell she was smart.
    How could she seriously need to ask why studying history could be beneficial? I almost started explaining to her like she was Aaron. Usual y with him it was vague statements because I knew he wasn’t really listening anyway.
    But then instead of just looking at her, I looked at her. She was genuinely interested in what I was going to say. While I stil felt the same way I always did around pretty girls—worthless and unworthy—something about her,