“Some days the rain just seemed to fit, and today felt like one of those days. The morning sky was dark, layered with the kind of thick black clouds that promised showers.”

“At some point, during the early hours of the morning, the dreams found their way in. they were dark dreams, treacherous, submerging Violet in their murky depths until she incapable of finding her way to the surface. At first the images were harmless, like some sort of crazy kaleidoscope, drifting in and out of focus, colliding and splintering and reforming again.”

“So, are you going to the lake today?” Jay asked, finally falling into step beside Violet as their pace slowed. They headed nowhere in particular when they hiked like this, exploring places they’d been more times than they could add up, both on, and off, the well-known paths.Violet shrugged. “Are you?”She already knew the answer; they both did. Today was the big end-of-summer party at Lake Tapps. Kind of a last blast before the sun disappeared for the year. Pretty much everyone they knew would be there.Jay shrugged too. “I was thinking about it.”Inwardly she smiled at the prospect of spending one of the few remaining lazy summer days with him at the lake. “Yeah?” she questioned, not needing him to actually ask her along. “Maybe I’ll go too.”He grinned, practically beaming at her, and an unfamiliar warmth that had nothing to do with the weather crept through her. “Cool. You can drive,” he suggested.She shook her head. If it had been anyone else, she’d probably feel like she was being used, but instead she loved the exhilarating feeling of having something he didn’t have, especially in light of the fact that he suddenly seemed to have everything that she wanted. “Fine, then you can buy me gas,” she added, raising her eyebrows and daring him to say no.”

“You're such a girl," she chided, but somehow the words came out too soft...too tender, and ended up sounding like a compliment.Jay just laughed. "So what does that make you, the guy?" He squeezed her hand even tighter, keeping it buried in his."Or some sort of lesbian," she teased, raising one eyebrow. "Maybe we should try out a little girl-on-girl action.""Nice, Violet. Do you kiss your mom with that mouth?" His eyes glinted as he watched her.She leaned closer to him in the darkness of the car's interior. "No, but I'll kiss you with it.”

“During those days before the girl from the lake was finally buried in her hometown, Jay had been the one who kept Violet sane. He slipped candy bars into her backpack for her to find and left little notes in her locker just to let her know he was thinking about her. She leaned on him every step of the way, and he never once complained. And afterward, when she felt back to her old self again, at least mostly anyway, he was still there.She wondered what she’d done to deserve a friend like him, someone who never wavered and never questioned. Someone who was always there . . . being supportive, and funny, and thoughtful.Violet stood in the hallway and watched him. He was digging through his locker looking for his math book, and even though she knew it wasn’t there, Violet just let him search, smiling to herself. Crumpled wads of paper fell out onto the floor at his feet.He seemed to sense that she was staring and he looked back at her. “What?” he asked.“Nothing,” she responded, the smile finding her lips.He narrowed his eyes, realizing that he was the butt of some private joke. “What?”She sighed and kicked a toe at his backpack, which was lying crookedly against the wall of lockers. “Your book’s in your bag, dumbass,” she announced as she turned away and started walking toward class.She heard him groan, followed by the sound of his locket slamming, before he finally caught up with her.“Why didn’t you say anything? Sometimes you really piss me off.”It was easy to ignore the harsh words when his tone was anything but scolding.She shrugged. “It’s fun to watch you scramble.”“Yeah, fun. That’s what I was thinking.”

“Your dad told me what happened today . . . out in the woods. He told me that you tracked down the guy who’s been killing all the girls around here . . . that you put yourself in danger.” Violet couldn’t tell if he was angry or annoyed . . . or both. He ran his hand through his messy hair in an agitated gesture that indicated he was getting all worked up. “And it’s not like it was the first time you’ve done that. Trouble seems to follow you wherever you go, and you’re the only person I know who doesn’t seem to care. I don’t even want to think about what could have happened to you if I hadn’t shown up last night while Grady was . . . assaulting you.” He paused as if it really was too much to think about, and then he continued to rail at her. “You can’t even go to the mall safely. I made a promise to your parents, and you just wandered off without even telling me where you were going.” His voice was suddenly too abrasive, and it felt to Violet like he was scratching his nails across a chalkboard.She bristled against the accusation in his tone, and suddenly he wasn’t the only one who was upset. “And you didn’t speak to me for a week!” she lashed back at him. “What was that all about? I spent the entire week waiting for you to stop ignoring me. And all because I didn’t bother to check in with you? You don’t get to tell me what to do! You’re not my father, you know.”“Thanks for clarifying that, Violet,” he said sardonically. “It would be creepy if you got your boyfriend and your father confused.”Violet practically jumped when he said the word boyfriend. Obviously she’d noticed that they’d gone beyond just friendship, but she hadn’t been entirely sure what that meant for them. Apparently Jay had it all figured out.”

“Maybe she'd just say she ran into a door; that seemed infinitely more plausible than the truth.”