This Is My Brain on Boys Read Online Free PDF Page A

away! Addie never could, which was odd since, having extensively studied the biology of infatuation, she should have been able to pinpoint who was in the midst of it.
    It was too complicated. She wished people would be more direct.
    For example, Ed’s reaction when Kris slid into the backseat. What was up with that? He seemed completely put off that Tess had offered him a ride even though there was plenty of room for everyone.
    â€œUm, Kris Condos ?” he’d said, as if he was a wanted criminal.
    â€œWe met on the plane,” Addie informed him. “He’s spending the summer at the Academy to atone for past sins.”
    Kris winced, and Ed looked to Tess, who said, “We’ve had a talk. Just go with it.”
    Which was unusual, because Tess knew Ed was not a “go with it” kind of person. He came from a long line of army generals who were big on discipline, rules, order, and military time. He was short, squat, muscular, and might otherwise have been impossible to tolerate had it not been for a wayward love of practical jokes.
    Before he and Tess had reached the endorphin level of their relationship, he’d snagged her phone and temporarily switched all her contacts to Lord of the Rings characters. Gollum was on speed dial.
    In contrast, Tess was one of seven children adopted by the Famous Actor Mothers who, when not starring in period dramas about English high society or medievalfantasies, were protesting US invasions abroad and chaining themselves to nuclear facilities.
    Ed and Tess were Addie’s first successful experiment, living proof that it was possible to induce attraction and even “love” between the unlikeliest of partners.
    Not that Tess was aware they were the first B.A.D.A.S.S. pair, of course. To this day, she remained convinced her “chance” meeting with Ed and subsequent romance had been nothing but pure kismet.
    As if.
    Weeks of planning had gone into ensuring that when she and Tess climbed Mount Washington in New Hampshire last fall—a feat in itself, since Tess loathed hiking—that Ed would be on the mountain to rush to her rescue with his Eagle Scout training.
    â€œIt wasn’t fate,” Addie once tried explaining to her best friend. “You sprained your ankle during a random nor’easter and Ed happened to be hiking in the area with a first-aid kit.”
    â€œYes, but he saved me.”
    â€œBecause he knew how to wrap an ankle.”
    â€œHe made a bier!” Whenever Tess arrived at this point in the story, she would sigh and get all dreamy. “He carried me down the mountain.”
    It was true that the bier was an impressive feat. Even Addie, who was with Tess when she hurt her ankle, hadto admit that Ed’s ability to fashion a stretcher out of interwoven twigs was inspired.
    They were scaling the infamously slick rock face of Huntington Ravine when Tess lost her footing and slid a good twenty feet, landing on a ledge not much wider than a park bench. By the time Addie crawled to her, Tess’s ankle was swollen like a butternut squash and growing purple.
    So were the clouds overhead. Mount Washington had its own weather system that could switch on a whim from hot to cold, calm to stormy like it was doing that Saturday afternoon. There was no way they’d be able to reach the safety of the Lake of the Clouds shelter at the summit with Tess barely able to move.
    â€œWe’ll find an outcropping of rock,” Addie had said, lifting an arm under her friend’s shoulders so she could at least hobble. “And then I’ll call for help.”
    Tess let out a little cry with each step. Meanwhile, the wind grew intense and big drops of rain started to fall as lightning flashed nearby. “We’re doomed,” she declared, sparing none of the drama that had made her the Academy’s reigning diva. “Oh my god. I’ve never been so scared.”
    Even Addie, who was well aware of