The Brightest Star in a Constellation

19: 384,400 Kilometres

☆ Evan ☆

On Thursday, at precisely eight o'clock in the morning, I am officially free from soccer. The clock on my phone ticks away another minute when Coach takes my permission slip and dismisses me from practice forever, and I step through the doorway into the school. It seems to take me an awfully long time to get from the field to the entryway. My feet drag through the grass as if it's made of wet cement, and my steps are leaving footprints behind.

Except I'm not leaving a trace. I'm leaving an empty space, a place where my body used to occupy. And I wonder how long it'll take before that space is filled. I was a placeholder—the background noise that isn't quite a song. Existing only to bridge the gap between nothing and something.

Since I'm in a position where I have nothing to do for the rest of the morning, I mosey into the building, heading for the cafeteria. Willow and Jenny are in the foyer, touching up the paint on the windows.

"Evan!" Willow yells out to me. She pretends to cast out a fishing line and mocks like she's reeling me towards her, and Jenny rolls her eyes while she isn't looking. "Good morning. Do you mind giving us a hand? Someone was supposed to finish painting two days ago."

She rests her annoyed glare on Lucas and Sebastian, both sitting on the bench to her right, mixing the buckets of paint. "Hey, Evan, do you have any idea how to make yellow?" Sebastian asks.

"Is that a serious question?" I retort.

Lucas snorts and replies, "You don't actually think we're that stupid."

"That's... debatable." I rise onto the bench next to Jenny. She immediately shuffles away, like she thinks I'm contagious.

Willow places her paintbrush against the window and draws a line, filling in the letter S with a brassy red. Her eyes crinkle in deep concentration, and she moves to flick the platinum blonde hair away from her forehead. "Again, I remind you both that this is your fault. If you'd listened to me, you would have finished this, and then we could move on to planning over the exam break. And then—"

Sebastian groans to silence her. "I thought we agreed that we'd stop talking about exams. I don't want to hear about it. Anything that doesn't happen this week is a problem for later."

"I second that," Lucas pitches in.

With a sigh, Willow hands me a paintbrush. I start to outline the next letter she's assigned me to, and the distant chatter from the cafeteria overtakes us for a moment.

It sticks until Willow breaks it to say, "Really though, I need to know what you think about the prom theme, guys. Before the sun explodes would be nice."

"You got it." Lucas waves his brush at her. Drops of paint land on the tile around him haphazardly. "I'm going to be honest. I don't get the theme. What the absolute hell does 'fantasy day at the beach' mean?"

Willow raises her foot and attempts to kick him. Her spindly limbs don't quite reach the bench, so Lucas swats her away. "It's in the name, Azan. Use those neurons of yours and figure it out. It's a fantastical day by the sea, except there are no dragons," she says.

"What you're saying is I can wear sandals to prom," Sebastian says.

Sighing, Jenny replies, "Not in a million years."