Signs of You Read Online Free Page A

coming apart, but I text him:
    LOVE SUCKS.
    One, two, three. He looks up and turns. He walks back to the car, opens the passenger door.
    â€œWhat?” he asks. “Love sucks?”
    I can feel a hot blush overtaking me, like I’m trying to hide the fact that I was just stung by a hundred bees. He stares at me, waiting for a response. As each second ticks by, I come no closer to inventing some sort of reasonable explanation for why I just texted him LOVE SUCKS . I stare at him blankly.
    â€œRiley,” Jay says, his brown eyes shining. “Why’d you text me that?”
    And just as I feel like I’m going to break, that I’m going to open my mouth and tell him everything, that I saw Mom, that I’m so into him—it happens. As quick as a breath, I catch a glimpse of something—or someone—right where Jay is standing. I scoot back, press myself against the driver’s side door. But it happens again. In and out. Like my eyes are failing me, losing focus; I see f lickers of blond hair and hazel eyes.
    â€œHang on,” he says. He looks down at his cell and texts away. My lungs lock up, refuse to draw a breath, but I manage to put the car in drive.
    â€œOkay, done,” he says. I don’t look at him. I’ve got my eyes pinned on the little gnats swooping in and out of my headlight beams. I can’t look over at Jay; I just can’t. “Sorry, I just felt like I had to text Sarah back,” he says. “What were we talking about last?”
    â€œI, I—” I stammer.
    â€œOh, right: love sucks. Why’d you text me that?”
    My mind won’t work. Say something. “Just don’t get too wrapped up with the wrong person. I’ve done it and it sucks, that’s all.”
    â€œWho? And when? You’ve never had a boyfriend—”
    â€œSomeone you don’t know,” I lie, manufacturing an imaginary person. I manage to look at him; he seems normal now, but totally confused.
    I can’t stay there one second longer. I put my foot down on the accelerator, the passenger door still hanging open. I leave Jay standing by the curb, in the dark. I don’t even look back in my rearview mirror. When I get about ten blocks away from his house, I realize I’m speeding. I nearly run a stop sign and slam on the brakes. The car comes to a screeching halt, halfway in the intersection. I look up at the jumble of stars in the sky, my heart bursting, racing.
    What’s happening to me?

Chapter 3
    You, Too?
    I crawl straight into bed when I get home, pulling the covers over my head like I did when I was a kid, hoping the outside world will disappear if I can’t see it. I huddle over my cell like it’s a tiny, warm campf ire. But instead of popping and crackling wood, I hear the pings and jingles of incoming texts. Jay asks if I’m okay, if I got home. I stare at the blazing blue messages, unable to write back.
    But f inally, slowly, my f ingers start to move over the keys. I manage to convince him that I’m all right, that I’m just missing my mom, that I’m stressed about the tests tomorrow. He doesn’t ask again why I texted LOVE SUCKS to him earlier. I kind of wish he would, because right now, in this blanket-tent, after this day . . . I just might tell him.
    For the next few hours, I stare at the glowing plastic stars on my ceiling and count sheep, telling myself this is all a bad dream. I can’t get much higher than 300 bleating, f luffy, maniac sheep jumping over a fence before I have to start counting over again. Somewhere around sheep number f ifty, they all take on an evil, sinister look.
    You’re nuts , they say as they propel themselves over a section of white picket fence. Resident . Jump. Of. Jump. CRAZY TOWN.
    At about three in the morning I decide to head to the kitchen and get some milk. I don’t really think milk is going to be strong enough to deal with whatever psychotic break