His phone buzzed. Leo. “Party at the point. Be there or be square, old man.”

He picked up his phone. Leo’s text still glowed. “Party at the point.”

He walked out into the September dusk, the air sharp with the promise of autumn. Seventeen was not an answer. Seventeen was a bridge, and he was standing in the middle, the past a dim shoreline behind him, the future a fog he couldn’t see through. But the wind on his face felt like something. Like maybe, just maybe, he wasn’t broken. Like maybe he was just becoming.

“Roo? Meatloaf’s in an hour.”