When she stepped out, nobody seemed to notice. They all carried on struggling with the furniture and laughing. Juliana spilled more water on herself, and Caitlyn said, “great job klutz,” in a teasing way.

“Hello?” Clarissa said.

Now Adam turned to look at her. “Oh, hello,” he said smiling. He stood up to shake her hand. “I’m Adam. It’s nice to meet you.”

Clarissa stuck out her hand. “Clarissa.”

“Nico’s girlfriend, right?” Adam asked, and hearing him say this the girls immediately stopped talking and turned to stare at them.

“Right,” Clarissa said, feeling uneasy with the way they were looking at her. You belong here. You belong here.

“I’ve heard so much about you,” Adam said.

“And I’ve heard so much about you,” Clarissa lied.

“This is Juliana,” Adam said gesturing to Juliana, who walked over and shook Clarissa’s hand.

“You’re the one in medical school, right?” Clarissa said, hoping it wasn’t obvious how hard she was trying to make a good impression.

“Yes, I am,” Juliana said, clearly delighted to be recognized.

“And this is Caitlyn,” Adam said, gesturing toward Caitlyn, who had followed Juliana over.

“I hear you’re great at music,” Clarissa said sticking out her hand.

“Well, you’ll have to tell me about yourself because I haven’t heard anything about you,” Caitlyn said.

Juliana stomped on Caitlyn’s foot. “Ouch!” Caitlyn yelled but didn’t take Clarissa’s hand or apologize.

Clarissa lowered her hand.

“You’ll have to excuse Caitlyn,” Juliana said. “It’s not personal, there’s just some unresolved drama.”

Clarissa bet she knew what it was, but kept her mouth shut. Be the bigger person. You belong here.

Just then the screen door slammed shut again and they all turned around. Standing just outside the door was a pale man with a black buzz cut and light green eyes. He had a tattoo sleeve up his left arm and dark circles under both his eyes. He wore a t-shirt with the sleeves cut off, ripped blue jeans, and sneakers with the laces untied. Despite being nearly ten years older and the obvious differences, he was clearly the boy from the photo.

“James!” Caitlyn called and ran to him. When she reached him, he smiled and threw his arms around him for a hug. Juliana and Adam followed quickly after Caitlyn.

“We were worried you would be late,” Adam said. “We’ve only got ten minutes till Nico shows up.”

“I’m never late,” James said.

Juliana snorted and rolled her eyes.

“I’m never late for anything important,” James amended. “Speaking of which, when did you get back here?”

“My spring break started two days ago,” she said. “I got in last night.

Clarissa walked up slowly, worried about disrupting the group. She knew she belonged at the party, but she wasn’t sure she belonged in what was clearly such an intimate reunion.

James looked at her, and for a moment his face fell, and Clarissa felt guilty about budging her way into a meeting of old friends, but then he smiled again. “You must be Clarissa,” he said.

“Yes, I am,” she said and stuck out her hand.

He started to reach out to take her hand, but stopped and stared at her shirt. “You also surf?” he asked.

She looked down. In all the chaos of arriving at the house, she had almost forgotten about the drama around the borrowed shirt. It said “Northern California Surfers Association” in big black letters and had a washed-out picture of a blue wave on a white background.

“No,” she admitted, “I’m just borrowing this shirt from Nicolas.”

James’ face became unreadable, and he took his hand back. I should have just changed. I should have never borrowed this shirt. I didn’t know it would be such a big deal. Clarissa looked to Nicolas’ other friends for support, but Juliana and Adam were giving each other a worried look, and Caitlyn glared at her. Clarissa tried to tell herself she belonged there, but couldn’t find it in herself. This was a mistake.

“Come on guys,” Adam said. “Let’s just finish setting up. Nico will get here soon.”

They finished setting up in silence.