Sara Shepard - Stunning

Hanna reached out and clapped her hands over Mike’s eyes. “Boo.”

Mike jumped, but then relaxed. “Heeeyy,” he said, drawing out the word. “What are you doing in here?”

Instead of saying anything, Hanna began to pepper the back of Mike’s neck with little kisses. Mike leaned into her, his bare skin warm against her tight dress. He reached back and raked his fingers through Hanna’s long ringlets. Suddenly, he whipped around, opened his eyes, and stared.

“Hanna!” Mike grabbed the towel from the bench and covered his bare torso. “What the hell?”

Hanna grabbed for the rope necklace Mike had worn ever since his family returned from Iceland and yanked him closer. “Don’t be shy. Just go with this. Isn’t this one of your sex fantasies?”

Mike stepped away from her, his eyes bulging. “Have you lost your mind?” He wasn’t checking out Hanna’s skintight dress or the super-high-heeled shoes that made her ankles ache. Instead, he was glaring at her like she was being wildly inappropriate. “You need to go.”

Hanna stiffened. “You seemed into it just a few seconds ago.”

“That’s because I thought you were someone else.” Mike pulled a T-shirt over his head and stepped into his pants.

Hanna leaned against the lockers, not budging. “Look, Mike, I want you back, okay? Things are over with me and my boyfriend. I know you want me back, too. So stop acting like an idiot and kiss me already!”

She punctuated this with a little laugh so that she didn’t sound complete pushy, but Mike just stared at her blankly. “You heard me at the mall the other night—I have a girlfriend now.”

Hanna rolled her eyes. “Colleen? Please. Don’t you remember how she had her head flushed in the Old Faithful toilet four times in sixth grade? And Mike, she’s a drama geek. You’re totally bringing down your popularity quotient by dating her.”

Mike crossed his arms over his chest. “Actually, Colleen has an agent for her drama stuff. She’s been on auditions for some big stuff on TV. And I don’t care about popularity.”

Yeah, right. “Is she easy or something?” Hanna was surprised by how bitter she sounded.

Mike’s face hardened. “I like her, Hanna.”

He stared at her unflinchingly, and the clouds in Hanna’s head began to lift. Mike wasn’t going out—and sleeping—with Colleen because she was willing, but because he cared about her.

Someone snickered from near the sinks, and Hanna spied James and Mason hiding behind the wall, hanging on every word. She wrapped her arms around her body, suddenly feeling exposed. They were laughing at her. Dorky Hanna, throwing herself at her ex. Dorky Hanna, making an idiot out of herself. She might as well have been fat again, with poop-brown hair and braces on her teeth. The ultimate chubby, ugly loser who nobody loved.

Without another word, she whipped around and marched out of the locker room, not even stopping when her ankle twisted beneath her. This isn’t happening, this isn’t happening , she silently repeated over and over. There was no way she had been beaten by someone as milquetoast as Colleen.

She slammed the locker room door hard and emerged into the silent hall. Suddenly, a new laugh rang through the corridor, high-pitched and even more sinister than the boys’. Hanna froze and listened. Was she crazy, or did that sound like Ali’s laugh? She cocked her head to the side, waiting. But just like that, the sound disappeared.

That night, Emily walked into the Rosewood Arms, a hotel near Hollis that was half quaint B&B, half fancy resort. The old mansion was once owned by a railroad baron, and each room was decorated with priceless antique cabinetry and a smattering of deer, bison, and lion heads. One of the wings had been converted into a spa. The baron’s old garage, which used to house dozens of top-of-the-line carriages and early race cars, was now the banquet hall.

On this particular night, the space had been rented out for Mr. Marin’s town hall talk. There were long rows of chairs facing a stage. A lone microphone stood in the center, and there were banners proclaiming messages like TOM MARIN FOR CHANGE and PENNSYLVANIA NEEDS MARIN. It was weird to see Hanna’s dad’s face on campaign posters. Emily still thought of him as the guy who’d once reprimanded Ali for throwing her Bubble Yum out his car window. Later, Ali had made them all go around in a circle, calling Hanna’s dad Mr. Moron —even Hanna, who had done it with tears in her eyes.

Emily scanned the crowd. There were people here she hadn’t seen in years—Mrs. Lowe, her old piano teacher, whose angular face always reminded Emily of a greyhound’s, was sipping from a Starbucks thermal mug in the corner. Mr. Polley, who used to emcee Emily’s swim team banquets, was looking at his BlackBerry near one of the windows. Mr. and Mrs. Roland, who had moved into the Cavanaughs’ old house, sat on folding chairs that had been set up near the stage, their daughter, Chloe, perched next to them. Emily ducked. Mr. Roland had gotten her the scholarship to UNC, but his lascivious behavior had cost Emily her friendship with Chloe.

The only people Emily didn’t see were her friends. As she turned mid-stride to look for them in a different room, she smacked into a caterer who was carrying a silver tray loaded with appetizers. The caterer shot forward, but he miraculously caught the tray before it fell to the floor. “I’m so sorry!” Emily cried.

“No worries,” he answered breezily. “Luckily, I have lightning-quick reflexes.” Then he turned around and did a double take. “ Emily? ”

Emily blinked. Staring back at her, dressed in a caterer’s tuxedo, was Isaac Colbert, her ex-boyfriend— and the father of her child. She hadn’t seen him since they’d broken up over a year ago.

“H-hey.” Emily’s heart pounded. Isaac looked taller than she remembered—broader, too. His brown hair was down to his chin, and a tattoo peeked out from under his collar. She stared at the black spiral pattern on his skin. What did his overprotective mother have to say about that? Given that Mrs. Colbert had cut Emily’s head out of all the photos of her and Isaac together and called her a whore, Emily couldn’t imagine she was thrilled her son had gotten inked.

“What are you doing here?” she blurted.

Isaac gestured to the logo on his breast pocket. COLBERT CATERING. “My dad’s company is providing refreshments. He’s a Tom Marin fan.” Then he stood back and looked Emily up and down. “You look . . . different. Have you lost weight?”

“I doubt that. I still feel like I’m hanging onto some weight from being—” She caught herself before she could say being pregnant and almost swallowed her tongue. What was wrong with her?

She’d almost called Isaac to confess a few times while she was pregnant—Isaac had been wonderful to her before that stuff happened with his mom. They used to talk for hours, and he’d been so accepting when she told him that she’d dated girls in the past. Then one wintery afternoon, they’d undressed slowly in his bedroom. He had been so sweet about wanting to make their first time meaningful.

But every time she picked up the phone to call him, she couldn’t figure out how to break the news. “Hey! I’ve got a story for you!” Or, “Hey, remember that one and only time we slept together?” And what would Isaac have said? Would he have wanted to give the baby up for adoption, too, or would he have demanded that they raise it together? Emily couldn’t imagine doing something like that—she loved kids, but she wasn’t ready for her own. Then again, Isaac might not even have believed her. Or he might have gotten really, really angry that she hadn’t told him earlier. It was something, she’d decided, she had to handle on her own. And so she’d flipped through the online profiles of hopeful adoptive couples by herself. When she came to an account for two happy, smiling people that read Loving couple married for eight years so excited to be a mommy and daddy , she stopped. Charles and Lizzie Baker said they were soul mates, went on kayaking trips on the weekends, read the same book at the same time so they could discuss it over dessert, and were fixing up their old house in Wessex. We will always let your child know that he or she was placed for adoption out of love , their profile had said. Something about it had touched Emily at her core.