“I guess there’s no point letting the flies have the cake,” a voice cut through the silence.

I held back a groan as my dad’s leach—oh, I meant fiancée—Patty approached the table. She picked up the knife Mrs. Holm had set next to the cake box. Patty dipped it between mine and Karen’s very odd designs.

“I didn’t even get a picture,” I grumbled.

Patty didn’t stop dividing the cake into little slivers. “Oops,” she said as she finished and started to put pieces on plates. She handed me one with a fork nestled on the side. The cake was L’s head.

I stared at the piece, decided it wasn’t worth trying to make Patty happy, and walked over to one of my younger cousins and gave it to him.

“Thank you,” he chirped.

Patty watched this with pursed lips and furrowed eyebrows. I crossed my arms and met her gaze with a dark one of my own. Patty flinched and went back to divvying out the cake.

***

The party turned more festive once people were loaded up with sugar. The talk grew from a low rumble to a pleasant roar, but I didn’t want to listen to it anymore.

I needed air.

I weaved my way across the room and left out the door Karen had. I crossed the large patch of grass and into the woods. It wasn’t too long before I stumbled onto Karen. She sat on the ground against a tall tree, her legs pressed into her chest with her arms around them. She’d buried her head in her knees.

“Hey,” I said.

I plopped down next to her and cringed as I realized my dress was white and last night’s rainstorm had drenched the ground. Oh well, I didn’t really like it anyways. I only wore it today because my dad had pleaded with me to, to please Patty.

“Is my mom okay?” Karen whispered.

“She will be when she calms down.”

“I can’t believe I did that.”

I couldn’t, either. Sure, sometimes Karen’s anger got the better of her and she said things she should keep to herself, but I’d never seen her do that with her mom. Mrs. Holm and her daughter were close in a way I wished I’d been with my mom. They were practically best friends, and not in the Karen-could-do-whatever-she-wanted-and-Mrs. Holm- would-one-day-steal-Karen’s-boyfriend kind of way. No, with her mom Karen had someone she could always turn to no matter the situation.

I wondered if Karen knew how lucky she was, how I envied her sometimes.

“You’re both going through a lot,” I said. Though true, I didn’t believe it justified her actions.

Yes, Miss High-and-Mighty, my inner voice jabbed. Go ahead and cast the first stone. It isn’t like you’ve ever said anything horrible to your parents when pissed off. You’re perfect, right?

I didn’t answer (it wasn’t healthy to, I’d read somewhere) but the brash honesty forced a nod out of me. I guess I was being unfair to Karen. Her family faced one of the most devastating occurrences a family could. If she was on edge a bit more than usual, so what? It could be a lot worse.

Karen sighed. “Yeah.”

Common sense told me it was time to change the topic. “So, this morning I woke up with a billion ideas for my book.” I didn’t fake the excitement in my voice.

“Awesome.”

I didn’t let her lackluster tone deter me. “I can’t work through them by myself. Why don’t you come over tonight and help me out? My dad made his spaghetti yesterday and I saved you a giant bowl.”

Karen finally raised her head. She was tomato red, her face damp, and her gaze reminded me of one of those dogs on the gut-wrenching ASPCA commercials. Her lips had grown terribly chapped. “I can’t.”

I wrestled lip balm out of the tiny pocket secured into the side of the dress. I held it out to her. “Why not?”

She took it. “You know my Aunt Lola, the rich one with all the fish?” She applied the lip balm and returned it.

“Uh huh.”

“She just told me today that she’s taking me to Costa Rica as a graduation gift. I’m going to be gone for three weeks.”

“When do you leave?”

“Tomorrow night.”

In my head, I counted off the days. My chest tightened as most of August flew by. “That only leaves about a day until you go to college.”

“A little over a week, actually.” Karen frowned. “I’ll barely have time to pack everything.”

“So…we aren’t going to be able to hang out before you leave?”

Karen shrugged. “I’m going to try, but it looks that way.”

I’d known since Karen got her acceptance letter in April that the bitter reality of growing up and furthering our education would tear Karen away from me, but I’d thought I had time to gradually get used to the idea. I’d believed I’d have all summer long to spend every moment I possibly could with her, almost to the point that I was sick of seeing her, just so it wouldn’t be as painful.

I wasn’t prepared for the abruptness of this. My throat burned and my eyes watered. What would I do without my best friend?

“Oh, Mo, don’t worry.” Karen held my hand. “I’ll only be an hour away. I’m going to come home on the weekends whenever I can, and I’ll have a lot of breaks, which I’ll spend with you. Plus, I’ll call you, every day if you want. It won’t be that horrible.”

“I’m going to miss you.”

“Don’t you say good-bye now.” Karen flashed a real, beautiful smile. “I promise we’ll have a proper farewell.”

I sniffled. “Okay.”

Karen squeezed my fingers before she released my hand. She sat back against the tree as I got myself under some control, though not much. I was miserable, and it would only get worse from here on out, but I didn’t want Karen to know that. She had enough on her plate as it already was. It wouldn’t be right for me to add anything more.

I bottled my feelings inside, put on the happiest face I could muster, and pulled my cell phone out of my cleavage (the only proper place to keep such devices). I went to the music player on the phone, set it on random and turned the volume to maximum. I placed it on my bare knee and caught Karen’s eye.

“Hopefully it plays something good,” she said.

“Me, too.”

I pressed ‘PLAY’.

The jolly, techno beats of Toy Box thundered into life around us. I leaned against Karen and closed my eyes. I didn’t allow myself to think anymore and pretended I didn’t know how to feel.