This Is How I Find Her Read Online Free Page B

steering the wheel through the road’s twists and turns. As if the car were telling her which way to go. Or she’d driven it this way before.
    â€œWell, are you ready?” she asked. We nodded solemnly, our dolls forgotten, completely replaced by our game with my mother. She turned back to the road. “Let’s see how fast.”
    â€”
    A noise that sounds like grr-hem snaps my attention back to where I am now, aware of the car, the radio tuned to Leila’s favorite station, that sharp corner of my math book.
    I twist uncomfortably in my seat, wishing I could go back to that moment, full of anticipation for what my mother would do next.
    Leila is looking at me, and I realize the sound must have been her clearing her throat. Did she say something? I wait a second to see if she’ll repeat it.
    But she doesn’t. I look past her, out the driver’s side window, and see that we’re already stopped in the school parking lot. Leila always parks in the small overflow lot at the back, the one that’s an entire school building away from the windows of the principal’s office. The radio’s still on, but Leila’s hand is on the key in the ignition, ready to turn the car off.
    A clump of people is walking toward us, each person trying to fit on the narrow mulch median bordered with stones that separates the rows of the lot. I recognize a few of them as friends of Leila’s from the jazz band she sings in, but I know only one: James, a tall boy with dark hair who seems to flop as he moves, as if all his limbs are noodles.
    Or I did know him. A shorter, younger version of him who used to play foursquare on the blacktop outside our elementary school with Leila and me, who would walk home with us almost every afternoon so we could run around in Leila’s backyard or ride bikes through her neighborhood. Aunt Cynthia worked with James’s mom, and he would stay with us until one of his parents came to pick him up for dinner.
    He used to be my friend too. Maybe even more my friend than Leila’s.
    In my head, I hear the rubber playground ball thwack against the pavement as James bounces it to our side of the chalk square. I hear Leila shout his name, annoyed, as the bounce goes high and she misses.
    She turns to me, her expression telling me she expects me to get the ball, but I shake my head. “No way,” I tell her. “It was in your corner.”
    James grins at me as Leila goes running after the ball, a grin that says hey, isn’t it nice to make her do the chasing sometimes? He produces a melting candy bar from his pocket and offers me half. I smile back from my quadrant, chocolate dripping from my fingers, and we’re allies.
    But I don’t know if he remembers any of that. As he and the girl next to him look toward where we’re parked, I turn away from the window, not wanting to make eye contact.
    Here, in the car, Leila is still looking at me, her expression asking, are you going to move, or what?
    I guess she decides the answer is or what , because she huffs, turns the car off, and shakes her head a little as she opens her door. She swings one leg out, then the other, then reaches around her seat for her bag. She gives me one more glance over her shoulder.
    Something about that look finally triggers me and I move, working my backpack out from under the glove compartment. My eyes skim over the initials on the front for the thousandth time, and I wonder who JKP is and whether I could slip into her life as easily as I slide her bag onto my back. I wish.
    Leila and I step out of our opposite sides of the car at the same time, shutting the doors with thuds that are almost synchronized. But that’s where the symmetry ends. She hits the door lock button and jumps right into a conversation with her friends. I hunch over, hook my thumbs under my backpack straps, and start to walk away.
    I glance back once to see James passing Leila one of his headphones