“To call you Rose.”
In bio, Rose’s lab partners were Selena Kearn and Astrid Mills, who were best friends and the two most popular girls in tenth grade. Selena, an ex-girlfriend of Nick’s, was all bouncy red curls and freckles; Astrid was a blond beauty with stick-straight hair and glowing skin. She always wore black; today, a black dirndl with black leather ties. Astrid was sure not to question Rose’s name change, as Kim had, because once upon a time Astrid had been Abigail; she’d changed her name in sixth grade. She’d understand.
Rose found herself staring at Nick Winter at the next virtual lab table, willing him to look at her. But why should he notice her now, any more than he ever had? She didn’t look any different, in the same overalls and the same flannel shirt and the same bangs she had to push out of her eyes—why’d she always let them get so long?
“Is she seriously serious?” Selena said to Astrid. “Nick?”
Rose gave her head a little tilt. “He’s not too hideous.”
“Oh my God,” Selena said. “Now she thinks she can just chime in.”
“She must be ill,” Astrid murmured. She often spoke in a low voice; people had to lean in to hear her.
“Never felt better!” Rose said brightly, and turned to Selena. “How come you broke up with Nick?”
Astrid let out a sharp laugh. “Who told you that?”
Selena’s face burned behind her freckles. “It was a mutual decision. We decided it would be best if we saw other people.”
“Sure,” Astrid said, “except he started seeing other people before arriving at this so-called mutual decision.”
“Why are we even having this conversation with her?” Selena asked. “She’s not part of anything!”
Just then the bio teacher, Mr. Slocum, was standing before them. Rose could swear she saw her own reflection in his shiny, bald head. “I trust you’re discussing your observations on the dissection? The outline is due in fifteen minutes.”
“No problem!” Selena said. “Such an interesting project!”
Mr. Slocum took a moment to give Rose a hard look. “You’ve been paying attention, I hope?”
“Absolutely,” Rose said.
“You think I can’t tell when my students are off in la-la land? I’ve been teaching for thirty years.”
“That’s wonderful!” Selena said. “You’re so dedicated.” As soon as he left, she said, “What observations? The whole project was a disaster!”
“You should write the outline,” Astrid said to Rose. “You were the one who messed it up last week.”
True, last week’s assignment had not gone well. “Okay, just catch me up on what I missed,” Rose said. “By the way, you may find this interesting, Astrid, since you changed your name a few years back. My new name is Rose. It suits me like a—”
“Whatever,” Astrid muttered.
That was easy, Rose thought, relieved.
CHAPTER 4
Everyone said Belle Heights was so boring, a big chunk of nothing in Queens, New York City. Belle Drive, the busiest street, was a museum, a fossil, a dinosaur compared to neighboring Spruce Hills, which had giant stores like Target, Home Depot, and Asteroid, and smaller, trendy stores opening all the time. But Rose decided she liked the fact that, except for the hydro-buses (and she could hear one wheezing behind her, a sure sign it was about to stall), long, winding Belle Drive had changed so little over the years. Especially now that she was changing so much. She’d spoken to a lady recently somewhere who seemed to know about these things—that Rose would change, that she would be so happy. If Rose ran into the lady again, she could tell her she was right. But how could you run into someone if you didn’t remember what she looked like?
No matter. It rained so lightly Rose didn’t even get wet as she passed a diner with a revolving display of layer cakes, a thrift shop, a cosmetics store, and an animal hospital—little places so close together they all seemed connected, like the apartment houses on Rose’s block. Some even shared an awning.
Inside Sassy Cuts, Rose spoke to a hairstylist whose nametag said Bridget.
“That was my mother’s name!” Rose said, amazed at the coincidence. Rose had no memory of her mother, who’d died when she was a baby, but there were pictures, of course, and apparently her mom had laughed a lot.
“What can I do for you?” Bridget said.
“I need to get rid of these bangs.” Rose flicked them away as if that was all it took to rid her life of them.
“Not a problem. They’re awfully long, anyway. You can hardly see your nice blue eyes!”
Rose described the exact, even, almost chin length she wanted, “So I can put my hair behind one ear if I want to. Please don’t go too short or I won’t be able to do that.”
“I’ll be careful.”
“It should be dark. Can you dye it, too?”