“I have one just like it,” she said. “It’s getting me through Jared’s absence. And the iPod has angry rock music,” she pointed out.

Oh, that’s right. I peered into the drawer again, seeing the iPod Touch already opened with earbuds wrapped around it. She must already have loaded music onto it.

“It will help you forget that asshole.” She referred to Liam. The reason I was in trouble in the first place.

“Maybe it will help me forget K. C. Carter,” I teased.

Bending down, I picked up the vibrator and caught myself wondering what kind of batteries it took. “Thank you, Tate.” I hoped she could hear the sincerity in my voice. “If nothing else, I already feel better.”

“Use them both,” she ordered. “Today. Also, use the word motherfucker at some point. You’ll feel a lot better. Trust me.”

And then she hung up without a good-bye.

I pulled the phone away from my ear, staring at it as confusion shredded my smile.

I’d said “motherfucker.” Just never out loud.

“I’m sure you’re probably very nervous, but after the first day it will be much easier.” Principal Masters powered down the hallway at my old high school as I tried to keep up. “And after ten days,” he continued, “it will be as comfortable as an old pair of shoes.”

Inwardly, I admitted that I was never allowed to keep shoes long enough for them to get comfortable, but I’d take his word for it.

“I just don’t understand,” I said breathlessly as I jogged up to his side, trying to keep pace, “how someone with no teaching experience—no teaching education—is expected to bring eight kids up to speed for their senior year.”

It was the dumbest thing I’d ever heard.

When I found out that I was going to be sent home to complete my community service, I was a little annoyed and whole lot relieved. While I certainly didn’t want anyone finding out about the idiocy that got me arrested, I also had no place to live in Phoenix for the summer. Coming home had been a lucky turn of events.

Even when my mother told me I would be staying at the Brandts’ empty house instead of shaming her with my presence at our home, I still thought it was better than hanging around Arizona, knowing that my ex was in our apartment with someone else.

But teaching? Whose brain fart was that?

“You’re not teaching,” Principal Masters shot back, turning his head only enough so I could see the side of his face. “You’re tutoring. There’s a difference.” And then he stopped and spun around to face me. “Let me tell you something about teaching. You can have the best teachers in the world with the most scientifically proven resources that money can buy and a teacher will still fail. Students need attention. That’s it.” He sliced the air between us with his hands. “They need your one-on-one time, okay? You have eight seventeen-year-olds on your roster, and you will not be alone. There are other tutors and other teachers running summer sessions in the school. The cheerleaders and band members will be around here and there, and then we have our lacrosse boys on the field nearly every day. Believe me, the school will be packed this summer. You’ll have lots of lifelines should you need them.”

“Do you hold every tutor’s hand like this?”

He smiled and turned to keep walking. “No. But then, I don’t have any other tutors completing court-ordered community service.”

Ugh. I’d blissfully forgotten about that for five seconds.

“I’m sorry.” I winced. “I know this is an awkward situation.”

“A very lucky situation.”

I loved the pep in his voice. Our principal had always been easy to talk to.

“It must be ideal to be able to come home for the summer to fulfill your requirement. And in the comfort of a place you’re familiar with.”

Yeah, about that … “How did I get this project?” I ventured, clutching Tate’s brown leather messenger bag from high school that I’d found in her closet this morning.

“I asked for you.”

Yeah, but …

“Your information popped up in my e-mail,” he offered. “I knew you, trusted you—for the most part—and knew that you shone at writing. Ms. Penley still uses some of your essays and reports to showcase to the other students. Did you know that?”

I shook my head and followed him up the stairs to the second floor, where my new classroom would be.

I loved writing. Always had. I was shit when it came to oral presentations, debates, or telling stories, but give me a pen, paper, and some time, and my thoughts came together perfectly.

If only life could be edited like a story, I’d rock.

He continued. “And I also knew that you had experience counseling kids at summer camps, so it seemed like a good fit.”

My flip-flops slapped the smooth brick floors as we reached the second level. “But you said my information popped up in your e-mail?” I asked. “Who sent it to you?”

“I never knew.” He scrunched his eyebrows at me, looking curious. “I figured it was just a paper pusher with the Corrections Department.” And then he stopped in front of what used to be—or perhaps still was—Dr. Porter’s chemistry lab. “And that reminds me”—he wagged a finger—“your special circumstances do not need to be broadcast. I trust I don’t need to tell you that, but I want to make it clear. These kids are not to know why you are here. Do you understand?”

“Yes, sir. Of course.” I fisted the strap of the bag hanging over my shoulder, feeling embarrassed. “And thank you for trusting me with this.”

His blue eyes softened, and he shot me a small smile. “This will be your room.” He nodded to Dr. Porter’s lab and then handed me the file folders in his hand. “Diagnostic assessments telling you where each student stands, teacher notes, lesson plans, and worksheet master copies. Study up, and see you Monday, K.C.”

And then he left, leaving me to look around and get the lay of the land. I had so many questions. These kids were seventeen. What if they didn’t want to listen to someone who was only a few years older? What would I do with behavior problems? Of course, Jared and Jaxon Trent no longer went to school here, but I was sure other douche bags had replaced them. And why were we holding tutoring sessions for writing in the chemistry lab? Didn’t I need to be fingerprinted to work with minors?

Oh, wait. I had been fingerprinted.

I laughed to myself, figuring it was better than crying. How shit changes.

When you’re in high school, you think you’re so smart and plans will always work out. You think you’ll be on the road to success with money in your pocket and a busy schedule, because you’re so important, having become exactly the person you always wanted to be as soon as you leave high school.

What they don’t tell you is that you’re more confused at twenty than you were at seventeen. And looking through the window on the door to the classroom, I rubbed the chills from my arms, wondering if I’d be even more confused at twenty-five than I was right now. The road had been clear before, and now it was so muddy that I could barely even walk.

But walking was all I was going to do this summer. Since I’d lost my license for a year, I let Nik take my car to San Diego with her and took comfort in the fact that I didn’t have any friends in town—right now, at least—that would make it a burden for me not to be driving.

School and the gym. Occasionally the grocery store. Those were the only places I’d be going, and they were all a healthy, but manageable, hike from Tate’s house.

I decided to head back there, opting out of stepping foot in the classroom until I had to. I deserved my punishment, but that still didn’t make it easier to face spending all summer in a hot, musty building filled with people who didn’t want to be there any more than I did.

Leaving the school, I dug out Tate’s iPod and fit the earbuds into my ears. As I scrolled through the playlist, I couldn’t help smiling as I realized I didn’t recognize a single song she’d loaded.

I loved Tate’s taste in music, even before I met her. But over the years I’d gotten tired of battling my mother on the songs she’d hear coming from my room, and so I gave up. On all music. I rarely listened to anything, because her voice would always invade my thoughts and ruin it.

Clicking on Chevelle’s “Take Out the Gunman,” I cranked up the volume so loud my ears ached. But I still broke out in a huge smile when that sexy voice started and fireworks started going off in my chest. I couldn’t hear my mother in my head or anything but the thunder of music, making me laugh, making my heart beat, and making my head bob as I walked home.

The neighborhood streets were calm, the occasional car breezing past, and the sun on my legs felt so warm I realized how much I had missed my hometown in the summer.

The lush green trees looming around me, their leaves dancing in the breeze. The smell of lawns being cut and barbecues grilling dinner. The children racing up to the ice cream truck as it pulled over to the curb.

I loved it all, and for the first moment in a very long time, I was at ease. Even despite the trouble I’d gotten into.

I realized no one was waiting for me, no one was watching me, and no one was bothering me. Eventually my mother would call. Eventually I’d have to go to tutoring on Monday. And eventually I’d have to return to my political science major in the fall.