Chapter 5

My heart was a mess, pounding all over the place.

I held the note, staring at the word "dummy"—and honestly, I wasn't even a little bit angry.

Instead, my nose started to prickle.

That night, sleep eluded me.

My mind was a total mess—on one side, I kept replaying all the times James bullied me growing up, and on the other, all those stories Emily told me about how he secretly looked out for me, plus that note he left for me tonight.

Those two sides of him twisted together in my head, driving me absolutely crazy.

A few days…