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girlfriend.
    â€œAimee!” Jimmy shoots past me. He stops short of holding her, or even touching her. “Shit, I...I just remembered something.”
    â€œWhat?” I say out loud. Instantly, I clamp my lips shut.
    â€œWhat?” Aimee frowns.
    Her hazel eyes are heavily made up as usual, but they’re bloodshot, like she’s been rubbing them.
    Or crying.
    â€œNothing,” I mumble. “I was just talking to myself.”
    â€œWe broke up last Friday,” Jimmy says, slumping. “For good this time.”
    My jaw drops. Why wasn’t this news shouted all across the universe? Have we just stumbled onto a motive for murder? I desperately want Aimee to go away so I can ask Jimmy who broke up with whom.
    â€œAre you...okay?” I ask her.
    We’ve never really had a conversation before. Just polite greetings. If she’s with her friends, she ignores me. I have no problem with that. Cheerleaders and me are like oil and water. The only thing Aimee Barton and I have in common is shortness. And now Jimmy.
    Her face hardens as if my question over her welfare offended her. “Why wouldn’t I be?”
    â€œI h-heard about Jimmy, and I thought...I thought...”
    A girl calls her name, but Aimee’s frozen, her gaze locked on me. “What have you heard about him?”
    I throw a helpless glance at Jimmy.
Do I pull her aside and tell her you’re dead? Shouldn’t your family be the first to know?
    â€œThat he...he’s missing.” I stare at a piece of paper lying on the floor. It’s imprinted with a dirty sneaker tread and infinitely easier to look at than Aimee.
    An audible choking sound rips from her throat. “You think he’s dead, don’t you?”
    Is my newfound clairvoyance written all over my face? My mouth drops open but I can’t make words come out.
    â€œDon’t tell her. Not here,” Jimmy says firmly.
    A perfumed posse rushes up to us. Or rather to Aimee. They all speak at once in high-pitched voices, and not-so-subtly elbow me out of the way.
    â€œI passed a news crew on my way to school. I bet they’re coming here. You should go out and talk to them!” says one breathless girl, clearly more concerned about getting on TV than she is about Jimmy.
    Another grabs Aimee by both arms and marches her into a nearby classroom. “He’s trending on Twitter...”
    Jimmy makes a move to follow the girls before realizing it’s pointless. He can’t talk to Aimee or touch her. He lets out another of his big sighs that I’m starting to associate with extreme frustration. “She came over to my house before school on Monday and begged me to take her back.”
    â€œWhy did you dump her?”
    He crosses his arms. “It’s no one’s business but ours.”
    â€œIs it a sex thing?” I ask, really curious now. Those two were always pawing at each other. It was kind of repulsive.
    Spluttering, he says, “I don’t talk about that stuff unless it’s with the guys in the locker room.”
    â€œCharming, but so typical of guys.”
    â€œAimee only wanted me for one thing, and it wasn’t sex.”
    I flatten my lips and try not to move them as I talk. “What was it? A shot at prom king and queen? Money?”
    He shakes his head. “I felt like I was part of a brand. You know, the Golden Couple. Everything we did was for show.”
    â€œBut you
were
like the Brad and Angelina of the school.” Without the paparazzi and the kids. Though both Aimee and Jimmy’s families are wealthy and not afraid to show it.
    â€œIt was an image,” he says firmly. “Anyway, she was about to kill that image all by herself.”
    â€œHow? How was she going to do that?”
    â€œLet’s just say I did her a favor by calling it quits.” He peers at me. “You’re kinda nosy. Anyone ever tell you that? This is none of your