The new skates were Bauer Vapor Hyperlites. Top of the line. The kind of skates I'd looked up once when Miles mentioned wanting them and closed the browser when I saw the price because that was half a month's rent and we didn't live in that tax bracket.
Caleb bought them like they were nothing.
Miles FaceTimed me to show them off – holding them up to the camera, turning them at every angle, his face incandescent with the specific joy of a thirteen-year-old boy who'd just been given the thing he wanted most by the person he admired most. "Caleb got them for me! He said I'd been working so hard at practice I deserved a reward. Look at the blades, Naomi. LOOK."
I looked. Smiled. Said all the right things – wow, those are amazing, you're so lucky, make sure you thank him – while something i
