"Where were you, Toby?"
The question startled young Mr. Isaacs. He stopped and looked pathetically at Liberty Van Zandt. "What do you mean?"
Liberty adjusted her glasses. "At lunch time. You said you'd come eat with us. Me and JT waited for you at our usual table outside, but we didn't see you."
Toby brushed past her. "I wasn't hungry."
His friend stared at him, disbelieving. "You're always hungry. If you're not eating, then something's wrong."
"Nothing's wrong. I'm fine." With that, he ducked into the boy's restroom, where he stayed until just before the bell rang.
That evening, the telephone rang in the combined Isaacs/Kerwin household. Ashley, sitting on the floor of her bedroom with her friend Terri, reached over and picked up the receiver. "Hello?"
"Is Toby there?"
Ashley sighed. "Hi Liberty. Toby's here, but he's asleep. He's gone straight to bed after school every day for the past week or so."
Liberty returned the sigh. "Is he alright? JT and I are worried about him. He's been avoiding us and he didn't eat lunch today."
Ashley paused for a moment, remembering Ellie's earlier comments on the subject. "Dunno. Something's probably bothering him, but he's not talking about it."
"Well, if he gets up, will you have him call me?"
In the next room over, the boy in question was not actually sleeping. He lay flat on his back, staring at the ceiling in his room. The room was too cold, too quiet and not dark enough. It just wasn't a very conducive environment for forgetting your worries.
"What do you mean, we were never that serious?"
"Don't take this so personally. I'm not trying to hurt you."
"Come on, Kendra. You tell me you're breaking up with me and then you say you're not trying to hurt me? You might as well stick a dagger in my heart."
Sometime over the weekend, he had managed to bring the bottle of Tylenol PM into his room with him. Over the previous few days, Toby'd found that the recommended dosage was having no effect on him. He'd been taking four or five capsules in an effort to drift off.
He thought about Liberty's comments earlier in the day. She and JT had missed him at lunch. But what about Kendra? Didn't she usually sit with that group? Maybe she was avoiding him, or maybe she just didn't give a fig whether or not he ate lunch.
"Can I talk to you?"
"I always have time for you, Kendra. What's up?"
"This is hard for me to say, but...I think we need to cool it a bit with our relationship."
"What?!"
"People are calling us girlfriend and boyfriend. Last year I thought that was pretty cool, but this year..."
"Are you saying you don't want to go out with me any more?"
Toby reached for the medicine bottle.