Chapter 2

Lynn pushes her long hair back. It’s soaking wet and heavy, and she can’t help but laugh. “This is so unlike me.”

“Is it not like you, or is it not like the you your parents said you had to be?” Carrie asks, and she reaches out and tucks some of the hair Lynn missed behind her ear.

“Whoa, I feel like that gif of the cat that says mind blown? You’re always doing that to me. You’re right. I’m still thinking how they’d react, how they’d tell me to be sensible, grow up, never take risks, but life isn’t always supposed to be safe. I don’t want that safe life. It’s not me.” Lynn feels powerful as she speaks the truth finally. Dripping wet, way in the back of a car with Carrie, she feels more at home in her skin than she ever has before.

Carrie’s face breaks out into the biggest smile Lynn has ever seen. “God, I’m proud of you.”