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ever.
    My cell phone buzzed. I looked at it and saw it was Claire Olivia. We hadn’t talked since I’d arrived on campus, and I knew I should pick up.
    I quietly declined the call.
    “Who’s calling you?” Steve asked.
    “No one important,” I said, smiling. “I gotta be honest.”

    Big-ass wrench number two appeared that night after dinner, when I went down the hallway to pee. I ran into Ben, the big guy from football who had rolled his eyes to his friend Bryce about me. They hadn’t sat with us at dinner.
    I know about urinal etiquette. For one thing, you don’t say anything beyond “What’s up” to another guy while peeing. It’s common courtesy. But I’d never had so much fun in one day, and here we were, two jocks, peeing next to each other. All I wanted to do was keep things going. So I broke the cardinal urinal rule.
    “How’s life?” I asked.
    Through my peripheral vision I could see him look up at the ceiling. “Fine,” he said.
    Silence.
    “That was a good game today,” I said.
    “Yup.”
    Again. Silence.
    “You’re not really supposed to talk at a urinal,” I said, like a crazy person. “I actually know that. I’m breaking the rules.”
    He laughed. “You’re a rebel.”
    I was so grateful that he’d said something back that I turned toward him. Maybe that wasn’t the greatest idea.
    “Dude,” he said, recoiling slightly. “Really?”
    I flinched back to the forward position as my entire face turned red. “Sorry.”
    He took a deep breath. “You missed, but should that even be an issue?”
    “Really, really sorry,” I said. “Very not cool. I can’t believe I just did that.”
    We went back to peeing next to each other in silence. There’s nota color for what I imagined my face looked like. Time for damage control. Major damage control.
    “I have a peeing problem,” I said. I meant it like a joke, like, “I have a drinking problem,” but as soon as the words left my mouth, I could see how it might not make sense.
    “Ah,” he said.
    “I meant it like a drinking problem. Not that I drink pee or anything, if that’s what you’re thinking.”
    “Of course,” Ben said very quietly.
    It was so awful that I couldn’t help myself. I started laughing.
    “This is the worst pee ever!” I said.
    This cracked him up too, and that made me feel a bit better.
    “I don’t think I’ve ever said so many wrong things at one time. Wow.” Tears were running down my cheeks now. I’d tucked myself away and was just standing there. Ben tucked himself in and flushed his urinal.
    “Wow. Well, I guess I’d say it was really nice, but, maybe just it was really weird meeting you? I’d shake your hand, but …”
    “Right,” I said. We both went to the sink to wash our hands.
    “I guess it’s been a weird day,” I said. “This is my first day ever at boarding school and —”
    “You don’t know how to pee in public. I get it,” Ben said.
    “You know what I mean.”
    “Yeah,” he said as he punched down on the paper towel dispenser a few times and tore off some sheets.
    “I feel a little out of place, I guess. It’s hard.”
    “We’re all out of place in our own way,” he said.
    I tore my own paper towel off the dispenser. “Deep,” I said.
    He smiled ruefully. “Yeah, real deep.”
    “No, I mean it,” I said, continuing to wipe my hands even though they were now dry. “I like stuff like that.”
    He averted his eyes, and I averted mine. We were back to weird, and I’d taken us there.
    “So, anyway,” I said, well aware that our conversation was basically over, but somehow, not wanting it to be. “I also have the weirdest possible roommate. Albie?”
    “Ah,” Ben said.
    “He has a police scanner and this apocalyptic poster thing. It’s freaking me out. Is he, like, a survivalist?”
    “I think he’s an ironic survivalist.”
    I laughed. Ben looked pleased.
    “Anyway, I’m not so thrilled about the whole ‘My roommate is a dork’ angle. Won’t