With that she turned, her blond hair and red dress disappearing down the stairs off the side of the stage and behind the heavy curtains.
Annie watched her leave before turning to Liam angrily, her eyes accusatory. “You take care of all of this,” she ordered Liam, waving her hands at the mess of kids and parents that still surrounded them. “I’m going to make sure she’s alright.”
And with that, Sadie Sullivan was no longer Liam’s. And he was left exactly where he’d been when she’d run away from him in high school, filled with regret and standing next to his high school tormentor.
10
Sadie
Sadierememberedthefirsttime she ever noticed William Cohen.
It was ninth grade algebra class, and her evil algebra teacher Mr. Masters was pressuring her to answer some inane question that she didn’t know the answer to—math was never her best subject.
She’d been sweating bullets at her desk, searching her brain for the correct answer. Suddenly, out of nowhere, this short guy who she’d barely noticed before had jumped out of his seat, yelling the answer. Was it in an effort to save her? Make her look dumb? She’d never really been sure.
William Cohen always seemed to be around after that. Forever in the background, she’d see him in a crowded hallway, in the crowded bleachers at her volleyball games, standing in line in the cafeteria … everywhere.
She knew by the way he looked at her that he probably had a crush on her, but she didn’t pay him much attention. She had more important things to think about: school, friends, volleyball, and the fact that she was going out with Tyler freaking Carter.
Tyler was cute, tall, attentive, andveryinto her. She didn’t have the brain space to deal with a quiet, nerdy kid who might like her but who was quite possibly frustrated with her ability to do basic algebra.
Tyler hated him, though. He complained about him to no end. Blabbering about how much “Little Willy” stared at Sadie too much, which just made her roll her eyes.
“Who cares?” she’d said. “It’s not like he’s staring atyou.”
But she’d secretly loved Tyler’s possessiveness and William’s secret pining. It thrilledher. She could admit in retrospect that the whole situation was a huge toxic red flag, but she’d been a teenager—not exactly a shining example of depth and morality.
Tyler was her first boyfriend, the first guy she’d kissed. She got off a bit on enticing him, making him crazy. Her priorities were out of whack, and they stayed that way for a long time. She could see that now. She should have been more mature about that situation, and she sure as hell shouldn’t have stayed with Tyler for as long as she had.
She’d made so many mistakes. It seemed she’d left a trail of them in her wake lately.
And now here she was, lying in her childhood bed, thinking about those mistakes and their many accompanying regrets.
This bedroom hadn’t been hers in the ten years since she’d gone away to college, and once she’d left, her parents had quickly transformed it into a guest-room-slash-sewing-room. While it was still the same bed that she’d slept in during high school, the hot pink walls had been repainted a sedate greige and the room was scattered with neutral decorations and sewing supplies.
Turning to her side, Sadie stared out the window. She’d opened the blinds about an hour ago so she could see the bright night sky. All of the stars were shining, and the moon cast a silvery light into the small bedroom, illuminating the middle of the room but creating pockets of darkness along the walls and closet door.
Struck by a sudden thought, she sat straight up in the bed and turned her body away from the lighted window until her feet were hanging off the side. She stared for a bit at the closed closet door before she quickly pushed herself off the bed.
Her feet were clad in thick socks, so her steps were quiet as she made her way across the carpeted floor. The room boasted a huge walk-in closet that she’d loved in high school. Her parents had all her boxes of memories and childhood souvenirs stored in large rubber containers stacked along its walls now.
Opening the door and pulling random boxes and baskets of sewing materials away, Sadie finally found the blue rubber container she was looking for: the one that contained her high school yearbooks.
She yanked open the container and ran her finger along the books stacked with the spines facing out until she found the yearbook from her sophomore year. Pulling it out of the container and walking back into the room, she sat on the floor in a bright beam of moonlight, flipping through the pages and scanning the rows of names and faces until she found him.
William Cohen.
He’d been so small. Sadie had been the height she was now, but William’s head had been a couple inches below hers then. She recalled how small he’d seemed standing next to her in the gym line.
He always wore button-down shirts, which everyone had thought was pretty weird. And he never talked to anyone. Did he have any friends? She couldn’t remember.
Tyler was always picking on him, accusing him of bothering Sadie. She never knew exactly what went down between them on a day-to-day basis. She’d been so oblivious and stupid. But it had all come to head one day in gym class. Tyler had claimed that William had been checking Sadie out while the class did cherry pickers.
William had sputtered his refusal, warily eyeing Tyler and looking beseechingly to Sadie for help. She’d just stood there, though, and Tyler had … attacked him. Like a wild animal, he’d started wailing on him. It was a side of Tyler that Sadie had never seen before.
She’d watched, not knowing what to do for entirely too long, before she’d finally pulled herself together and ran to their gym teacher, who’d briefly stepped out of the room.
The teacher had run back, pulling Tyler off William, but at that point William had just lain there, beat down and frozen.