their words. The beat of my heart in my ears is too loud. I stare down at my plate wearing my best fake smile, the one I hope says I am just a random classmate of your son’s and there is nothing to see here.
But, as is my luck, my invisibility doesn’t last long. I’ve taken only a couple more small bites of food when I hear: “So, how do you and Zach know each other?”
My breath catches. I look up from my plate. She is staring at me, expectant. A parent asking her kid’s friend a normal question. I don’t know if I can do this—have an actual, real conversation with this woman. She’s connected to David in a way I can’t totally comprehend—she’s breathed the same air as him, sat across a room from him, looked him in the eye. A silence stretches between her question and my response, a painful silence that starts to eat through my skin and gnaw my bones.
Zach jumps in, trying to deflect her attention from me. “We know each other from school, Mom.”
“Ah.” She sounds surprised. She takes a couple deliberate bites off her plate and then turns to me again. “It’s just…you look so familiar. I thought I knew all of Zach’s friends. Have we met before?”
I shake my head. It’s beginning to seem quite possible that my voice has failed and I’ve been rendered permanently mute.
Zach responds for me again. “She’s new, Mom.”
My stomach flips. I wanted to get through this dinner without Michelle Teller finding out any details about me at all.
“Where did you go before?” She tilts her head like she’s really looking at me for the first time.
“Before?” My voice squeaks out, all high-pitched.
“Before QA? Where did you go to school?”
I start to speak—“I was homeschooled”—but Zach’s voice tumbles over mine.
“She went to Carter.”
My mouth drops open, because What the fuck, Zach? but when I glance at him he looks so shocked at what just came out of his mouth that I can’t summon up the energy to be mad. This moment feels inevitable. She was going to find out. I knew it the second she walked into this house.
Something flashes across Michelle Teller’s face, but she composes herself before I can decipher it. She raises an eyebrow. “Oh? You went to Carter?”
I nod.
She furrows her brow. “What did you say your name is?”
I swallow. Zach’s hand finds mine under the table.
“May?” My name catches in my throat.
“May.” She purses her lips. “That’s not a very common name.”
I shrug. A lump of terror churns in my stomach.
“What’s your last name, May?” She narrows her eyes at me.
“Hey, Mom.” Zach intervenes again. “Lay off.”
She cuts him off with a look.
“McGintee?” I choke on the word.
“McGintee?” She glances at Zach to confirm. All the blood has drained from his face. “Did she say McGintee?”
He nods.
Gwen and Mr. Teller are silent. The entire table has stopped eating. Everyone is watching Michelle Teller and me like they’re waiting for an explosion.
“As in Jordan McGintee? As in his twin sister?” she says in a strangled tone.
When I hear my brother’s name, I spring to life for the first time since dinner started. Who does this lady think she is, throwing his name around like it’s hers to say?
“Yes. Jordan was my brother.” My voice is shaky, which pisses me off. I force myself to meet her eyes.
“I’m very sorry for your loss, May.” Her words sound cold but the look she gives me runs counter to them. She looks devastated. Worried beyond belief. Like she has no idea how to handle this situation.
Well, good—that makes two of us.
She turns to Zach’s dad. “Did you know about this?”
“No. I had no idea.”
Fury bubbles up farther into my stomach with every second that passes. How dare she