“Thanks, Fa.” I reached for it, but when I went to take it, my arm almost gave out. “What’s in here?”

“Open it up.” Thorsten tended to be a pretty calm guy, so it was strange to see this much anticipation on his face.

“Oh my God,” I breathed. “You got me a laptop? Really?”

“I thought you would need it for school. And I know you fill your journals up pretty quickly, so now you can have it all in one place. If you don’t like this model, we can switch it, but I did some research and I think this one is pretty good.”

“Pretty good? Fa, this is top of the line. Thank you. So much.” I got up and we made our way towards one another awkwardly. I put my arms around him and hugged him hard. “Thank you. I’m going to use this so much.”

“Well, I know it couldn’t have been easy for you to leave all of your friends and your school to come to Denmark.” Thorsten’s eyes are very light blue and his hair is very blonde, so he always looks kind of young and uncertain, but now he looked even more so than usual. “I just want you to know that I appreciate you doing it for me, and you didn’t even whine or anything.”

“Fa, you’re good to us. I love you. I wouldn’t whine. Thank you so much.” For a second I thought about my biological father and was glad that he and Mom hadn’t wound up together just because of me. Because there couldn’t be a better guy than Thorsten to have as a dad.

Mom was right behind him and we took a few minutes to ogle over the new gadgets and all of the cool software that Thorsten had built in. I didn’t know much about computers, but I knew for a fact that this cost a huge chunk. Mom petted my hair and kissed my cheeks, and then she stopped suddenly.

“Look at this room, Brenna!” she cried.

“I’ll clean it up in a little bit.” I was surprised that she was so upset about my school stuff. Mom was usually pretty laid back.

“No, Brenna, look at this room!” She put her hands up and shook them dramatically. “This is a little girl’s room. This is not the room of a world traveled teen. That’s it.”

“What’s it?” I asked, but I felt energetic suddenly. Mom’s enthusiasm was always infectious.

“My birthday gift to you. We’re going to redo your room.” She framed it out with her hands and moved them around like she was checking camera angles for the before and after pictures I knew she‘d want to take. “Whatever you like. Whatever you want.”

“Even if I want black walls?” I tested.

“Even if you want to paint blood dripping down them,” Mom said calmly. She knew I would never paint my room black, but even if I wanted to, she would find a way to make it look awesome. My mom could take the ugliest thing and make it amazing.

“Thank you, guys.” I was looking forward to redecorating my room with them. Maybe it was because I was an only child, but I’d actually always liked having Mom and Thorsten around. We had fun together, but they weren’t always in my business. I could do things without having them breathing down my neck.

“I have off this weekend. We’ll go to IKEA,” Thorsten suggested.

“I’ve got a catalog!” Mom gushed. “You can look through it tonight, sweetie, then we’ll go pick everything up. This will be so fun! We can look at paint samples at that little store by the mall.”

“Sounds good.” I smiled when Thorsten winked at me. Mom brought the catalog in and measured the room and windows before she kissed me goodnight.

When I was alone, I was psyched to find out that I had wireless access, and that it actually worked. I had set up my Facebook page in Denmark, but I hadn’t looked for many of my American friends. I just felt like it was odd to send friend requests to people I hadn’t seen in months and who might not even remember me or want my request. Most of my friends were cousins and family, but tonight I did some searching. I sent a request to Kelsie, Saxon and Jake.

All three of their profiles were set to private. Kelsie’s profile picture was really pretty. Unlike most Facebook girl pictures, she wasn’t making a duck face at the camera or pouting. She was smiling, and her smile was real and gorgeous. Saxon’s picture was just his silhouette, and he was wearing a hoodie, so I could barely make out his face. Jake’s picture was of him leaned against a dirt bike, his arms crossed. He was smiling and there were flecks of mud all over his face. Since I would have to wait for them to accept my requests before I could see their pages, I logged off and went to sleep.

That night, I dreamed about Jake and Saxon. In the dream they were racing dirt bikes. We were in an arena that looked a lot like Medieval Times, and I realized that they were racing for Kelsie. She was the princess, and the winner of the race would get her hand in marriage. I was really mad, watching them, but I didn’t want to show it.

The next morning I was in a crappy mood before my feet even hit the floor. I took my shower and got ready for school with a dark cloud over my head I just couldn’t shake. Mom was waiting with oatmeal and ideas for my room. We chatted for a while, and she clicked her tongue when I went to get on my bike.

“It’s good for me,” I said. “I like it.”

“It’s freezing. They’re saying this cold snap is breaking records.” She hugged her body and shivered for effect.

“I’ll keep my hat and scarf on. I promise.”

“Wear your helmet,” she sulked.

“I always do.” I kissed her, then started out, and if I was a little bit excited to see Saxon, I didn’t admit it. First of all, he was seeing Kelsie, and she was pretty much the only friend I had. Secondly, he was trouble. You just got this sense about him, like no matter how into you he pretended to be, he would be kissing you with his eyes on the next pretty girl he noticed. I pedaled harder, building a really solid case against him. By the time I made it to school, I was pretty sure I could look him in the eye and hate him.

Then I saw him leaned against the bike rack and all those little fragments of carefully built up hate slid out of my head and got replaced with a warm, happy excitement I couldn’t stamp out. I popped my iPod into my pocket and tried not to look like a complete fumbling dork while I locked up my bike.

“Hey, Saxon.” I wasn’t going to ignore him. I wasn’t going to be rude.

“I want to take you out,” he announced out of the blue, without preamble. His dark eyes focused on me with wolfish interest.

“I thought you were taking Kelsie out.” I pulled off my hat and smoothed my flyaways.

“It’s just a date, Blixen. It’s not like we’re going to get married.” There was a razor edge to his voice.

“Would you tell Kelsie that you were taking me on a date?” I challenged.

“What you and I do has nothing to do with anyone else.” His voice was a little snarly. I tucked my hair behind my ears and looked at him for a long time.