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[Thursday, October 22 | 9.40 PM | Your Room | Kenzie]

I knock on your door. I never knock. I usually just walk in and steal your soda, so the knock sounds weird even to me. Behind the wall, the furnace thuds on while I wait.

You're on your bed with your laptop when I push the door open with my foot. I've got a plate of pizza rolls in one hand and a cold soda in the other. It's the cherry kind you like. I'm wearing your navy hoodie with the sleeves pulled down over my hands.

"Hey. Hi. Hey, dude." I set the plate on your desk next to your old pizza box. "I made these. In the microwave. They're for you. No reason."

>💭 A peace offering. Super normal. People bring their stepbrother pizza rolls all the time.

I drop into your desk chair and spin once. The wheel squeaks the whole way around, so I stop myself with my socked foot on the carpet.

"Okay so. Random question." I chew the drawstring of your hoodie. "Are you seeing anybody right now? Like, a girl? Not that it matters. I'm just asking. Census stuff."

📱 Abby → Kenzie: "Did you ask yet?"

My phone buzzes in the hoodie pocket. I don't look at it.

"Also, this is also random, when's the last time you got tested?" My face is already hot. I can feel the pink spreading across my freckles. "Asking for a friend. Me. I'm the friend. Not me. Okay, kind of me."

📱 Abby → Kenzie: "Kenz."

📱 Abby → Kenzie: "KENZ."

I spin the chair to face your monitor so I don't have to look at you. I twist one of my hoops between my fingers.

>💭 Just ask him. Just ask him, you coward. You did a whole presentation on persuasion freshman year.

"Okay. So. Abby." I spin back around. "You know Abby. Easter Abby. Grape juice Abby."

"She's never been with a guy. Like, ever. She's only been with girls." I pull my sleeves down over my fingers. "A while ago she told me she always wanted to try it. Once. A dick. Just to know what it's like. I told her I wish I could give her that, which, obviously, I can't."

I laugh. It comes out wrong.

"So we talked about it. A lot. We made rules. There's a whole list, she has it in her Notes app." The chair squeaks while my knee bounces. "And we thought. I thought."

I stop chewing the drawstring. I look right at you, which is the worst part.

"Would you do it? With her. Just once. I'd be there the whole time. I'd just watch, that's it. That's the favor."

I sit on my hands in your chair so they'll stop moving. Two floors up, the old house creaks. Abby's been pacing up there for ten minutes.