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we’d never had a fight before. Best friends fought.
    When I got home from Cousins, I put Taylor’s shoes and her clothes in a bag, ready to take them over to her house as soon as she gave me the signal that we were done being mad at each other. It was always Taylor who gave the signal, the one who initiated making up.
    I waited, but it didn’t come. I went to Marcy’s a couple of times, hoping I’d run into her and we’d be forced to talk things out. Those times I was at Marcy’s, she never came. Weeks passed. The summer was almost over.
    Jeremiah kept saying the same thing he’d been saying for all of July and most of August. “Don’t worry, you guys will make up. You guys always make up.”
    “You don’t get it, this isn’t like before.” I told him.
    “She wouldn’t even look at me.”
    “All of this over a party,” he said, which pissed me off.
    “It’s not over a party.”
    “I know, I know—hold on a sec, Bells.” I heard him talking to someone, and then he came back on the phone.
    “Our hot wings just got here. Want me to call you back after I eat? I can be quick.”
    “No, that’s all right,” I said.
    “Don’t be mad.”
    I said, “I’m not,” and I wasn’t. Not really. How could he understand what was going on with me and Taylor?
    He was a guy. He didn’t get it. He didn’t get how important, how really and truly vital, it was to me that Taylor and I start off our last year of high school together by each other’s side.
    So why couldn’t I just call her, then? It was partly pride and partly something else. I was the one who had been pulling away from her this whole time, she was the one who had been holding on. Maybe I thought I was growing past her, maybe it was all for the best.
    We’d have to say good-bye next fall, maybe it would be easier this way. Maybe we’d been codependent, maybe we’ll always have summer · 51
    more me on her than the other way around, and now I needed to stand on my own feet. This is what I told myself.
    When I told this to Jeremiah the next night, he said,
    “Just call her.”
    I was pretty sure he was just sick of hearing me talk about it, so I said, “Maybe. I’ll think about it.”
    The week before school started, the week I usually came back from Cousins, we always went back-to-school shopping together. Always. We’d been doing it since elemen-tary school. She always knew the right kind of jeans to get. We’d go to Bath & Body Works and get those “Buy Three, Get One Free” kind of deals, and then we’d come home and split everything up so we each had a lotion, a body gel, a scrub. We’d be set until Christmas, at least.
    That year, I went with my mom. My mom hated shopping. We were waiting in line to pay for jeans when Taylor and her mom walked into the store carrying a couple of shopping bags each. “Luce!” my mom called out.
    Mrs. Jewel waved and came right over, with Taylor trailing behind her wearing sunglasses and cutoff shorts.
    My mom hugged Taylor, and Mrs. Jewel hugged me and said, “It’s been a long time, honey.”
    To my mom, she said, “Laurel, can you believe our little girls are all grown up now? My gosh, I remember 52 · jenny han
    when they insisted on doing everything together. Baths, haircuts, everything.”
    “I remember,” my mother said, smiling.
    I caught Taylor’s eye. Our moms kept on talking, and we just stood there looking at each other but not really.
    After a minute, Taylor pulled out her cell phone. I didn’t want to let this moment pass without saying something to her. I asked, “Did you get anything good?”
    She nodded. Since she was wearing sunglasses, it was hard to tell what she was thinking. But I knew Taylor well. She loved to brag about her bargains.
    Taylor hesitated and then said, “I got some hot boots for twenty-five percent off. And a couple of sundresses that I can winterize with tights and sweaters.”
    I nodded. Then it was our turn to pay, and I said,
    “Well, see you at