“Come on.” They headed upstairs, Cruz holding the carved-wood railing and hopping, with Shade behind her ready to catch her if she fell backward.
Shade’s room was on the second floor, walls a cheerful yellow, a gray marble bathroom visible through a narrow door. There was a queen-size bed topped by a white comforter. A desk was against one wall. A dormer window framed a padded window seat.
And there were books. Books in neat shelves on both sides of the desk, between the dormer and the southwest corner, piled around the window seat, piled on an easy chair, piled on Shade’s bedside table.
Shade swept a pile of books from the easy chair and Cruz sat. Shade stepped into her bathroom and came back with a bottle of rubbing alcohol, tissues, a yellow tube of Neosporin, a box of bandages, and a glass of water.
“Put your leg up on the corner of the bed,” Shade instructed. Cruz complied and Shade laid the ice bag over the twisted ankle. “Take these. Ibuprofen; it will hold the swelling down and dull the pain.”
“You’re being too nice,” Cruz said. “You don’t even know me.”
“Mmmm, yes, that’s what everyone says about me,” Shade said with a droll, self-aware smile. “That I’m just too darn nice.”
Cruz carefully wiped blood away, using her phone as a mirror. Then, suddenly remembering, she pulled a small, purple Moleskine notebook from her back pocket. It was swollen from curb water in one corner, but otherwise unharmed. Cruz stuck it into a dry jacket pocket with a sigh of relief as Shade fetched a trash can for the bloody Kleenex.
“Shade Darby, by the way. That’s my name.”
“Cool name.”
“It’s something to do with the moment of my conception. I gather there were trees. Not the kind of thing I ask too many questions about, if you know what I mean. And you’re Cruz.”
Cruz nodded. “In case you’re wondering, I have a dick.”
That earned a sudden, single bark of laughter from Shade, which in turn raised a disturbing red-and-white smile from Cruz.
“Is that a permanent condition?” Shade asked.
Cruz shrugged. “I don’t have a short answer.”
“Give me the long one. I’ll tell you if I get bored.” She flopped onto her bed.
“Okay. Well . . . you know it’s all on a spectrum, right? I mean, there are people—most people—who are born either M or F and are perfectly fine with that. And some people are born with one body but a completely different mind, you know? They know from, like, toddler age that they are in the wrong body. Me, I’m . . . more kind of neither. Or both. Or something.”
“You’re e), all of the above. You’re multiple choice, but on a true-false test.”
That earned another blood-smeared grin from Cruz. “Can I use that line?”
“I understand spectra, and I even get that sexuality and gender are different things,” Shade said, sitting up. “This is not Alabama, after all. Or it didn’t used to be. Our sex ed does not end with Adam and Eve.”
“You’re . . . unusual,” Cr
uz said.
“Mmmm,” Shade said.
“I like boys, mostly,” Cruz said with a shrug. “If that clears anything up.”
“Me too,” Shade said. Then, with a small skeptical sound, she added, “In theory. Not always in reality.”
Cruz gave her a sidelong glance. “I saw you with that boy, the tall, dark, and crazy-good-looking one?”
“Malik?” Shade was momentarily thrown off stride. She was not used to people as observant as herself.
“He likes you.”
“Liked, past tense. We’re just friends now.”
Cruz shook her head slowly, side to side. “He looked back at you, like, three times.”