This One Moment by Stina Lindenblatt Page B

guy magnets. But she had a boyfriend whom she loved. And even if she was interested in Nolan, he wasn’t mine, and never had been. He was free to stare at any girl he wanted to.
    “Well, this explains the excitement at the nurses’ station,” Kayla said. “The prodigal rock star has returned.” She hugged me hard, squeezing the air from my lungs. And I silently thanked the pain-med gods for my happy state of oblivion when it came to the pain I’d otherwise be feeling.
    Kayla pulled away and whacked my arm. “Don’t ever do that again. Promise me.”
    “Er, what exactly am I promising you?” For all I knew, she was referring to something that had happened during those five days missing from my memory.
    She gestured at the hospital bed. “This. You being attacked. Getting yourself almost killed. It’s the unspoken deal we made when we agreed to be best friends. Remember?”
    I chuckled. “I do vaguely remember something about that.” I looked at my other best friend, who was still watching Kayla, frowning. “Nolan, you remember Kayla, right?”
    Kayla gasped in her fake melodramatic way, hand on her chest. “How could he not remember me? He and I were almost inseparable.” She winked at him.
    Inseparable
was the last word I would’ve used to describe them.
    Nolan’s puzzled expression transformed into one of surprise, his eyebrows raised. “You look…different.”
    “You mean I don’t look fat anymore.”
    Nolan glanced at me for confirmation that he was standing in front of a live grenade. “Didn’t say that.”
    “You’re saying I still look fat?”
    Some things never changed. Like when Nolan had put worms in Kayla’s lunch in elementary school after she poured glue on his artwork project. She claimed she’d been helping him get an A. He thought different.
    “No, you look great. You always did. What happened? You took Hailey up on her offer to run with you?”
    Kayla ran her finger along the IV machine. “No, my mother died of a heart attack. I didn’t want that to be me.”
    Silence weighed down the room at how much in common they shared.
    “Sorry about your mom,” Nolan said, voice strained. I longed to hug him and give him some sort of comfort. It couldn’t have been easy for him to return to Northbridge with all the memories waiting to drown him.
    “I know,” she said. “And I’m sorry about what happened to your mom and sister. You left before I could tell you.”
    Nolan didn’t respond. He walked stiffly to the windowsill, picked up the bouquet of pink roses, and read the card.
    Kayla’s expression was a mix of regret and sadness. Not because she was still thinking about her mom. She had long since moved past it, except for at certain times of the year. She realized, like I did, that Nolan hadn’t pushed past his sister’s and mother’s deaths. He still hurt and would probably continue to feel that way for a long time. Murder wasn’t something you could easily walk away from, especially given that he was there the night it happened. He might’ve even witnessed it. The last I’d heard from Brandon, Nolan had blocked out the memories of that night. He simply could not remember at all what had happened. Was that still the case?
    Kayla’s face brightened. That combined with the impish grin was the only warning I got before she blurted out, “So how long are you staying in town?”
    “I’m not sure yet,” he said. “I’m worried about what happened to Hailey. I want to make sure no one tries to hurt her again.”
    If I thought Kayla’s face was bright before, that was nothing compared to now. Even the sun couldn’t compare with it.
    Which made me all the more nervous.
    “If you’re worried about her,” she continued, avoiding eye contact with me, “you should stay at her place. I happen to know that her roommate is moving out, and Hailey hasn’t replaced me yet.”
    While Nolan looked like he could kiss her, I was ready to hit her with a…with my pillow. That