I gazed over his shoulder at Dad, who was leaning against the cramped motel room wall. His dyed brown hair was matted to his head and his brown eyes were bloodshot. He looked like he hadn’t slept in days, but he gave me a slight nod of encouragement.
I closed my eyes and imagined who I wanted to be. Because anyone had to be better than the broken girl Alice was.
“Beth,” I whispered. I’d just started reading Little Women and Beth’s character was described as living in a happy world of her own. That’s just what I needed.
“Hmm.” Mark rubbed his chin. “You picked Alice from the Wonderland book, right?”
I nodded, surprised he knew that. He hadn’t been in my room that day.
“Did you know Lewis Carroll based that character on a real girl named Alice Liddell?”
I sat up. “No.”
“What if we use Beth Liddell?” He stood. “It’ll be our little secret, the connection between your names.”
A hint of a smile formed on my lips. “Okay.”
And even though I soon found out Beth ended up dying in Little Women, that was how the tradition was born. I picked the first name and Mark picked the last. I went alphabetically, because it helped me remember what letter my name started with every time we moved, and he chose something related to my prior first name. Which was simple, given it always came from a book or movie or song. It gave me an easy answer when someone asked about my name. Because, like Sawyer, someone always asked. It was the one constant I found everywhere we went: people were curious.
I’d been Charlotte from Charlotte’s Web, Elise from The Cure’s “A Letter to Elise,” and Jenny from Forrest Gump. And now Sloane from Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. Hey, it was on TV when I was picking. And who wouldn’t want to be the girl having a fun ditch day with her boyfriend?
I nodded at Sawyer. “You guessed it—I’m named after Ferris Bueller’s girlfriend. And you—” I tapped a finger against my lip “—must be named after Tom Sawyer.”
Sawyer’s mouth dropped open in offense. “No. I’m named after Sawyer from the TV show Lost.”
I snickered. “That show wasn’t on TV yet when we were born.”
Jason chuckled.
“Busted,” Livie sang.
Sawyer blushed. “Okay, fine. I thought it would go over better with the ladies if I was named after a sensitive bad boy rather than some kid in a boring old book.”
I placed a hand over my heart. “I happen to like that boring old book. And if your ladies can’t figure out how to Google when a TV show first aired, maybe you need to find some smarter ones.”
Sawyer gave me a lazy smile as his eyes roamed up and down my body. “Maybe I should.”
Livie’s eyes danced. “It’s going to be so entertaining to watch you crash and burn again.”
Sawyer glared at her.
Dial it back, Sloane. Blend in. Be forgettable. Start asking them the questions. “So,” I said, “what other senior stuff is coming up?”
Sawyer wiggled his eyebrows at me. “Prom.”
“Career day,” Livie added.
“The senior trip,” Jason said.
Livie gasped and released Jason’s arm to point at me. “You and I can room together! This is perfect!”
Good God, how far is she going to take this First Day Buddy thing? “What’s the senior trip?”
Jason straightened a stack of napkins on his tray. “It’s a school tradition that all seniors take an overnight field trip to Charleston the last weekend in April. Everyone goes. We visit Fort Sumter and tour the city and eat good food.”
“And people smuggle alcohol along and party in their hotel rooms,” Sawyer said.
Jason shot him a pointed look. “But not too much alcohol, right?”
“What?” Sawyer’s voice was a little too innocent.
“Last time you drank, you got pissed someone beat you at cards and punched a hole in the drywall in your basement.” Livie shook her head. “I know you haven’t forgotten being grounded for a month.”
“Whatever,” Sawyer muttered. A blush crept up his neck.
Livie turned back to me. “So what do you think?”
School traditions and parties and alcohol were all things I tended to stay away from. Plus, I wasn’t sure how Mark would react to an overnight field trip. But a tiny flutter of excitement ran through me. Because traveling, actually going to a new place just to sightsee and hang out and not have to change names to do it, sounded amazing. “Is it too late for me to sign up?”
“Not at all. The forms are due in two days. You have to room with someone of the same sex and I’ve been having trouble finding someone.”
She must seriously be in need of some female friends.
“But the roommates don’t really matter,” Livie continued, “because I heard the chaperones go to bed early and everyone sneaks out and hooks up.” She peeked sideways at Jason.
Jason’s shoulders tensed. He picked up a napkin, scrunched it into a ball and held it out to Sawyer. “Bet you can’t get this into that trash can.” His eyes brightened as he pointed at an open, industrial-sized, round plastic trash can sitting about twelve feet away.
Livie rolled her eyes and pulled her phone out of her pocket.
I suppressed a smile as more memories came flooding back. When Jason and I were little, we made bets about everything, like who could run around his house three times the fastest or who had the longest french fry in their Happy Meal or who could knock the most action figures off the deck railing with a Nerf gun. Making goofy bets was one of the things about the old me that had disappeared the fastest.
Sawyer cocked an eyebrow. “Loser has to make all the shirts for the scavenger hunt?”
“You’re on,” Jason replied.
Sawyer took the napkin from Jason.
My hands itched to snatch it from him and shoot it myself. The girl Jason knew had been a horrible basketball player who never could’ve made the shot they were talking about. But I’d just left Lexington, Kentucky, home of the University of Kentucky, where basketball is king. Mark and I had really gotten into the Wildcats’ season, and had even gotten a basketball hoop at our house. We’d spent hours playing each other. I tucked my fingers under my legs so I couldn’t grab a napkin and turn it into a ball.
The boys each made their first shots and missed their second, Sawyer’s by a good two feet. At the start of round three, Sawyer got a lucky bounce, his ball ricocheting off the rim and disappearing inside. But as soon as Jason lined up for his shot, I could tell his trajectory was off. The napkin hit the side of the trash can and landed on the floor.
“Yes!” Sawyer raised his hands in triumph.
I so could’ve beaten them both.
“Your gloating is childish,” Livie said without glancing up from her phone. For a second I thought she was talking to me.
Jason turned to Sawyer. “Looks like I’ll be decorating T-shirts.”
“T-shirts?” I asked.
“Every scavenger hunt team wears matching shirts,”