Besides Sean, Richard is the person I spend the most time with. My friendship with Sean makes sense to people—even if they mistakenly think we’re dating.

My friendship with Richard confuses people. He’s not a very friendly person, unless you get to know him. And he kind of has an undeserved reputation for being violent. He does have some anger-management issues, but he would never hurt anyone.

The only thing Sean and Richard have in common is the fact that both are tall White boys who go to the same high school. And they are friends with me.

Richard is sitting across from me at my kitchen table on Saturday afternoon. His shock of black hair is standing up at odd angles. “Let’s get to it,” he says, gesturing for me to open my chemistry notebook.

“I can’t believe you’re making me study chemistry before we head to the movie,” I say.

Richard shrugs. “Believe it.”

When I turn my notebook to the appropriate page, Richard stares at my notes in mock horror. I have all the information there, but it’s sort of a mess. “Jesus, Tea. What the hell am I looking at here?”

He points to a half-legible scrawl in the corner of one page. “I don’t know why you don’t take notes the right way first.”

I shrug. “Because my brain doesn’t work that way.”

“You mean your brain doesn’t work.” Richard pages through my lawless notes and shakes his head. “Seriously, Tea, if this is what you have to work with brain-wise, I’m not sure how you make it through the day.”

“Nice. We’ll see who gets a better score on Monday.” My mind-mapped notes might be a bucket of chaos, but I kick ass at balancing polyatomic double displacement equations. It’s a gift.

We work through all the odd-numbered problems in the book, checking the answers in the back. Richard grudgingly admits that I know what I’m doing. After about an hour of balancing equations of every type, I can barely see the subscripts on the page anymore. I rub my eyes. “Not sure how many more of these I can do.”

Richard glances at his phone. “You're in luck. It’s time to go.”

“What, now?” I raise my eyebrows.

“Yes. I know you like to be late, but I don’t.”

It’s not that I like being late; I just have a problem with the concept of time.

We go to the nearby multiplex that has been newly remodeled with reclining seats. Richard and I split the exorbitant cost of pop and popcorn and make our way to screen 4b. It’s already dim inside.

“Slow down. I want some too.” Richard glares at me as I take a handful of popcorn.

“Don’t worry. Once the previews start, it’s all yours,” I say. I don’t like chewing popcorn while trying to listen to other things.

I love watching movies in the theaters, but I can’t stand how loud they push the sound. Shocking, I know. Richard makes fun of me for putting in my good earplugs. I flip him off, earning me a glare from some woman who is here with her young children. As if they have never been exposed to someone with a middle finger before.

I don’t know why I am so irritated by this. But honestly, the movie is rated PG-13, anyway, so if she has a problem with her kids being exposed to vulgar hand gestures, she probably bought tickets for the wrong show.

I hear a familiar voice nearby. So does Richard.

“Hey there’s Sean and—” Richard starts to say in his loud and obvious voice. I elbow him in the ribs, and he glares at me.

Three rows in front of us, Sean and his girlfriend, Sophie, are taking their seats. The same Sophie I have no desire to meet. Their heads are bent toward one another. Sean pushes the armrest back so they can snuggle up next to each other.

Richard and I have naturally opted to retain our armrests.

I don’t pay much attention to the movie. It’s your usual Marvel fare—pretty much the only thing Richard and I could agree on. Don’t get me wrong. I love superhero movies. And if you are going to see them, it’s best to see them on the big screen because: special effects. Richard is completely engrossed in the film as expected, slowly demolishing the remainder of the popcorn.

I am trying not to look at the people sitting in front of us. But here I am, sitting behind them while she rests her head on his shoulder. He has his arm around her. And here I am. Alone. Even though I am not actually alone.

I am consumed by a flare of unwelcome jealousy. Because it’s supposed to be like this: I put my head on his shoulder. He puts his arm around me. Or at least holds my hand. She is welcome to kiss him and all that. I should get the rest.

I try to remind myself that I am not the same as his other friends. He told me himself that no one could replace me. What we have is different. But suddenly I am wondering if that’s true.

What if some time in the months since he and Sophie started dating, Sean realized that I am only an ordinary friend. And he’s just being polite and staying by my side. Because he is a nice guy.

As the movie comes to an end, my mouth goes dry. It figures there isn’t even any ice left in my cup. Maybe we can leave early. No. There are the after-credits. Richard would never leave before then. They are going to see us. Of course they’re going to see us. It’s not like we can sneak out of the theater. For all I know, they saw us coming in.

Plus, Richard has zero tact and no ability to read other people’s more subtle emotions—like monstrous, creeping dread. When Sean stands up, he turns and sees me. I wave at him and flash a pathetically weak smile. Sean smiles brightly as he walks up the stairs in our direction. Great.

“Tea! Richard! What a surprise. This is Sophie.” Sean and Sophie both seem thrilled at this unwelcome meeting. I am not.

“Hello,” I say. We all exit the room with the rest of the moviegoers to stand awkwardly in the lobby of the theater. My eyes are looking everywhere but at Sean and Sophie. I realize I’m being rude, but I can’t seem to help myself.

“Wanna grab some food?” Sean asks.

Somebody please say no, please say no, please say no.

“Sure. If Sophie doesn’t mind us encroaching on your date.” Why did I say that? Why didn’t I keep my damn mouth shut?

Sophie, of course, agrees. “Everyone needs to eat, right?” Her voice has a bell-like quality, almost like she is singing.

I turn to face her as she speaks—I hadn’t looked at her closely before—and I discover that Sophie is stunning. And by this, I mean that looking at her, I am stunned, rooted in place for a moment.

It even feels like my heart stuttered. She is almost exactly my height, but after that the resemblance ends. She has olive skin and thick black hair twisted in a loose bun. She’s not dressed up or anything, just jeans and a T-shirt, but it’s a fitted shirt that flatters the curves of her figure, and the deep-red color suits her complexion.

I usually don’t spend a lot of time thinking about my appearance, but now I feel horribly self-conscious. I’m pretty sure I washed my hair this morning, so I have that going for me. What am I wearing? It doesn’t matter. Why do I care about first impressions?

Who am I kidding? If I had known I was meeting Sophie, I would have agonized over every detail. Right down to painting my toenails, no doubt, which I never do unless I am very nervous—particularly not when they won’t be visible anyway.

It’s not like I want to compete with Sophie to see who can be prettier. Even if I wanted to do that, there is no point. I mean, look at her. It’s not that I want to look better than anyone else. This whole thing about paying attention to minute details of my appearance? It’s something I get from my piano performance persona.

When I am not as prepared as I would like to be, when I think I might royally screw up and make a complete ass of myself during the performance, I take great care in all of the non-musical preparations.

I make sure I have a kick-ass dress, I do something on purpose with my hair, I take time to put on fabulous makeup. And believe me, that takes time since I don’t have a lot of practice. This way, even if everything goes wrong with the performance, I can console myself with the fact that I might have screwed up, but at least I looked amazing.

Today? I do not look amazing. I barely paid any attention to what I put on. I think I am wearing a second-day T-shirt. I have a chair in my room where I throw dubious articles of clothing that can’t be trusted to return to the drawers with the actually clean clothes but may be passable to wear around the house or spend time with my less-observant friends. Pretty sure that’s where my entire wardrobe (sans unmentionables) came from today.

“Thanks for that,” I say to Richard when we get into his car.

“What?” Richard looks confused. “Sean is your friend.”

“Never mind.”

I steel myself for the coming ordeal.