“Hi,” I said, my voice cracking slightly. It took me almost five minutes to initiate this conversation.
She didn’t reply right away. She just pulled out her chair and sat with such silent grace it felt rehearsed. Then she looked at me, really looked, and nodded once. “Hey.”
My brain forgot how to function for a full three seconds.
Andrea Balfager wasn’t like the other girls here. She didn’t try too hard. She didn’t laugh loudly or twirl her hair or bat her lashes.
She wore black boots, oversized hoodies, and had a single silver ring on her thumb. Her handwriting was sharper than mine. Her energy was calm, like… winter.
I didn’t know why being near her made my palms sweaty.
“So,” she said, pulling a paper from the project folder, “do you wanna do the research, or the talking part?”
