It was pretty obvious Lena wanted to be asked. Another mysterious thing about girls- they want to be asked to stuff even if they don't want to go.

I'd ridden to school with Link every day since kindergarten, when we became best friends after he gave me half his Twinkie on the bus. I only found out later it had fallen on the floor.

The library was home away from home to my mom, and my family. We had spent every Sunday afternoon there since I was a little boy, wandering around the stacks, pulling out every book with a picture of a pirate ship, a knight, a soldier, or an astronaut. My mom used to say, "This is my church, Ethan. This is how we keep the Sabbath holy in our family.

I smiled at her, but she was already lost in thought, looking around the library as if it held all the answers to all our problems.

Kind of like love before first sight.” and “Butterflies in your stomach. That was such a crappy metaphor. More like killer bees.

A little-known fact about me: I read all the time.

I had never been this mad at her before. It was one thing to be attacked by someone you hated, but this was something else. This was the kind of hurt that could only be inflicted by someone you loved, who you thought loved you. It was sort of like being stabbed from the inside out.