Starry Eyes

by Jenn Bennett

  We’re also talking seriously about trying to hike the Pacific Crest Trail. It’s more than twenty-five hundred miles long, running through California, Oregon, and Washington—all the way from Mexico to Canada. It takes six months to hike the entire thing. I’m not sure if I’m up for that just yet—or ever, actually—but if we start next June, we can do part of the trail from the High Sierras up through the Cascade Mountains and stop at the Canadian border.

  We’ll see. Right now, we’ve been camping every other weekend. Just short two-night trips—nothing majorly off trail. This weekend, we’re going up the coast to Redwood National Park in Humboldt County. I won’t lie: Half the fun of camping is the potential for sexlaxation. But I’m actually enjoying being outside, away from the city. Lennon is using his mapping skills to get me to nearby areas with clear night skies; I finally started using my portable telescope to take photos, instead of hauling it around for no good reason.

  “I hate to break it to you, but you’ll have to get your own cupcakes,” Lennon tells his moms. “I have a hot date with an astrophysicist at the Jitterbug.”

  “That’s me,” I say, waving my hand. “I’m the hot date.”

  “Isn’t it too late for caffeine?” my mom warns.

  “Is it ever?” I ask.

  “Herbal tea, please,” she says.

  “I’ll think about it.”

  “We’re actually going there to do homework,” Lennon admits. “Decent Wi-Fi and an employee discount are a potent combination.”

  I started working there part-time after school a couple weeks ago. I practically live there now, but that’s okay because (1) I’ve always loved their coffee, and (2) now I get paid to drink it. I also need all the money I can get, because camping is expensive when you’re broke.

  “Back by ten,” my mom says. “It’s a school night.”

  Lennon salutes her as I tug Andromeda’s leash. We tell everyone good night and head out of the shop into night air that’s starting to get a little chilly. It feels pretty good, actually, and it’s not so brisk that Andromeda minds. We’ve been walking her several nights a week, and she’s perked up considerably, as if she has a new lease on life. And maybe she does. I think she missed walking with Lennon over the last year. My mom says pets can get depressed when their owners do. Or maybe it’s just that we see a lot more of Grandma Esther’s perky dogs, and Andromeda’s had to learn to keep up.

  Lennon takes her leash and she trots ahead of us, tail swinging as she scouts our trail. He slings an arm around my shoulder as we saunter to the corner and wait for the streetlight to turn green.

  “Okay, milady,” Lennon says. “We both know we’re not doing homework at the coffee shop.”

  “I finished mine during fifth period,” I confirm.

  “Finished mine at work earlier while I cleaned out gecko cages. Multitasking to the rescue.”

  “We are so good,” I say, holding up my hand for a fist bump.

  “The best.” He knocks knuckles with me, his arm still resting on my shoulder.

  Juggling school and work and us hasn’t been easy. It helps that we get to eat lunch together every day in the school courtyard. We sit with Avani and her boyfriend, and sometimes Brett, unfortunately. Once he begged Lennon for forgiveness in his part of what’s now known as the Battle of Mackenzie Falls, we haven’t been able to get rid of him. Reagan, on the other hand, transferred to private school. The official word is that she’s no longer focused on the Olympics, so she doesn’t need the support of our athletic department. Unofficially, Reagan’s parents forced her to transfer after she was busted over the glamping incident.

  I wish I could say we made up, but that hasn’t happened yet. I’m ready to forgive her, but she has to meet me halfway. The days of me kowtowing are over.

  “So where are we headed tonight?” Lennon says. “Mission and Western Avenue, or Mission and Euclid Street?”

  We now have four different routes we walk. One is our old path, from when we were kids, and one goes through the farmers’ market, which is so deserted at night, it’s practically romantic—you’d be surprised what two people with dirty minds can do on bales of hay. Two of the routes go in different directions around the edge of the Bay, but my favorite one snakes through a park, where we can climb a hill and look at the city while sitting under a big old oak tree. It’s not dark enough for ideal stargazing, but it’s private enough for making out.

  Oh, the make-out spots we’ve discovered. They’re on all our routes.

  “It’s too brisk for the Bay routes,” I say. “Andromeda will get fussy.”

  “We could take Wick Boulevard up through the edge of the warehouse district and cut through to the train tracks up on the hill.”

  “That sounds suspiciously like a fifth route.”

  “It does, doesn’t it?”

  For our one-month anniversary, he made me a picture map. It has all the milestones of our intersecting lives. Where we met. The night we played poker with his dad. Our first fight. Our first kiss. The homecoming debacle. The sequoia cathedral. The night we said I love you at the observatory.

  A map of us.

  It’s years in the making, and it’s messy and convoluted, some of it even tragic. But I wouldn’t change the route, because we walked it together, even when we were apart. And the best part about it is that it’s unfinished. Uncertainty isn’t always a bad thing. Sometimes it can even be filled with extraordinary potential.

  “So what will it be?” he asks when the light turns green. “Old route, or new route?”

  “Surprise me,” I say.

  He smiles down at me, and I thread my fingers through his. We put one foot in front of the other. Clear head, steady steps. And we move forward.

  Acknowledgments and Thanks-a-Millions

  For their hard work:

  Laura Bradford, Taryn Fagerness

  Nicole Ellul, Lucy Rogers, Sarah Creech

  The entire Simon Pulse and Simon UK teams

  For cheerleading:

  Karen, Ron, Gregg, Heidi, Hank

  Brian, Patsy, Don, Gina, Shane, Seph

  For feedback:

  Aya Sharif

  For inspiration:

  Yosemite, Sequoia, and Kings Canyon National Parks

  City of Berkeley, California

  Nancy Grace Roman, Neil DeGrasse Tyson, Carl Sagan

  Tsugumi Ohba, Takeshi Obata

  Kimberly Saul

  For existing:

  Every single librarian

  Every single bookseller

  And you

  Author the Author

  Jenn Bennett is an artist and RITA Award–nominated author of the Arcadia Bell urban fantasy series (for Kindling the Moon) and the Roaring Twenties romance series, including Bitter Spirits, which was chosen as a Publishers Weekly Best Book of 2014 and was the winner of the RT Book Reviews Choice Paranormal Romance Book of the Year, and Grave Phantoms, which was awarded the RT Book Reviews May Seal of Excellence for 2015. She is the author of Alex, Approximately, and The Anatomical Shape of a Heart (titled Night Owls in the UK) was her first YA contemporary romance. She lives near Atlanta with one husband and two evil pugs.

  Simon Pulse

  SIMON & SCHUSTER, NEW YORK

  jennbennett.net

  Visit us at simonandschuster.com/teen

  Authors.SimonandSchuster.com/Jenn-Bennett

  Also by Jenn Bennett

  Alex, Approximately

  We hope you enjoyed reading this Simon & Schuster ebook.

  * * *

  Get a FREE ebook when you join our mailing list. Plus, get updates on new releases, deals, recommended reads, and more from Simon & Schuster. Click below to sign up and see terms and conditions.

  CLICK HERE TO SIGN UP

  Already a subscriber? Provide your email again so we can register this ebook and send you more of what you like to read. You will continue to receive exclusive offers in your inbox.

  This book is a work of fiction. Any references to hi
storical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  SIMON PULSE

  An imprint of Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing Division

  1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, New York 10020

  www.SimonandSchuster.com

  First Simon Pulse hardcover edition April 2018

  Text copyright © 2018 by Jenn Bennett

  Black-and-white interior illustrations copyright © 2018 by Jenn Bennett

  Jacket photograph copyright © 2018 by plainpicture/Cavan Images/Nick Roush

  Photograph of boy by the campfire copyright © 2018 by Jill Wachter

  Photograph of starry sky copyright © 2018 by Thinkstock

  All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form.

  SIMON PULSE and colophon are registered trademarks of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

  For information about special discounts for bulk purchases, please contact

  Simon & Schuster Special Sales at 1-866-506-1949 or business@simonandschuster.com.

  The Simon & Schuster Speakers Bureau can bring authors to your live event. For more information or to book an event contact the Simon & Schuster Speakers Bureau at 1-866-248-3049 or visit our website at www.simonspeakers.com.

  Jacket designed by Sarah Creech

  Interior designed by Tom Daly

  The text of this book was set in Adobe Garamond Pro.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: Bennett, Jenn, author. Title: Starry eyes / by Jenn Bennett.

  Description: First Simon Pulse edition. | New York : Simon Pulse, 2018. | Summary: When teens Zorie and Lennon, a former couple, are stranded in the California wilderness together, they must put aside their differences, and come to terms with lingering romantic feelings, in order to survive. Identifiers: LCCN 2017025646 |

  ISBN 9781481478809 (hardcover) | ISBN 9781481478823 (eBook)

  Subjects: | CYAC: Survival—Fiction. | Friendship—Fiction. | Dating (Social customs)—Fiction. | Camping—Fiction. | Family problems—Fiction. | California—Fiction.

  Classification: LCC PZ7.1.B4538 St 2018 | DDC [Fic]—dc23

  LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017025646