I drop the sign into a new box for his personal things while I finish the clothes, because it was his hand that made this, and it seems like something someone might want to keep. His mother wants a different box for his personal things, so I keep this separate, before going back to the clothes.

His polos are hanging in the closet, rugby-striped, his go-to school uniform. We have to wear collared shirts at school, though that unifying thread is taken in many different directions: button-downs; fitted preppy polos; relaxed rugby-style; sweater vests over white oxfords. Girls can also opt for dresses, skirts, or capris, in addition to the rule for the boys of pants in khaki, black, or navy.

Everything about our school is a few degrees fancier than the norm.

This closet is School-Caleb. The drawers hold the relaxed version, the one he would become at three p.m.—a spare pair of jeans and a T-shirt always in his locker for after hours.

Hanging in the corner of the closet is a black zipped-up bag, the suit he wore last October for Homecoming inside.

I place my fingers at the cold zipper, but leave it closed. It had been his dad’s, he told me that night, when I ran my hands down his sleeves appreciatively. I remember seeing it as something new, how he filled it up, growing into the absence, a person with the same dimensions. My heart had ached for him when he told me—his father had died when he was younger, but his stepfather, Sean, had been in the picture for as long as I knew him, so that sometimes it was easy to forget that, to overlook what was missing.

Still, it was a simple statement that bonded us closer. A piece of his past that he was letting me see.

I toss the bag on the bed—it’s almost person-sized, and it does something to my head, making me believe I will uncover something different inside. My fingers itch. I unzip the bag. The scent of starch escapes first, and I know it’s been dry-cleaned.

I don’t take it out, because it’s pressed perfectly and neatly and exactly as Caleb meant to leave it. And it has its own history, like a family heirloom. I run my hand against the fabric inside. I close my eyes and feel him spread out his arms at my front door, letting me do the same that night. It’s gray pin-striped; an older style.

“Wow, look at you,” I said, and whatever Caleb was about to say as he looked me over halted, with my brother in the background, waiting for his teammates who would all be heading over together with their dates.

My mom snapped a picture of us, his arm tucked around me, his tie matching the sky blue of my dress, and his eyes. He and Julian did this awkward handshake in the front parlor while I introduced them, though I was sure they already knew each other—knew of each other, at least.

“Bye, Mom, bye,” I called as I pulled him by the hand, both of us smiling, everything so new we couldn’t wait to be alone.

When Julian called after me, “See you there, Jessa,” it sounded like a warning.

While every other guy at the dance wore plain black or dark gray, jackets optional, Caleb stood out. The suit made his eyes look bluer, his body leaner. I remember the feel of the fabric as I leaned into him, his hands on my back, the music beating in time to our movement. The whole night, a blur of laughter and color.

The school cafeteria was transformed into a dance hall, the full moon visible through the big windows spanning the entire wall, everyone dressed up like this was a different place than the one where we spent every lunch hour, and we were different people.

I try not to think of his jacket thrown haphazardly in the backseat of his car after. His tie that matched my strapless dress, undone. My fingers on the buttons of his white button-down shirt. His hands on my bare shoulders when he kissed me. The way he said, “Lo, Jessa Whitworth, I think I like you,” after.

The way he said things like lo and hark now like he was tempering everything in case he needed it to be a joke.

The next morning, at breakfast, Julian told me, “Be careful with that kid, Jessa. He’s older than you.”

“Just a year,” I’d said. And Julian looked at me like he had missed the fact that I was no longer the kid in middle school playing dress-up and singing karaoke in my bedroom. “Besides,” I said, “he’s friends with Max.”

I’d known Max since elementary school, in the same way I knew most of my brother’s baseball acquaintances: they were just there. Same as I was to them. And then I went to school, and an entire team of people already knew me as Julian’s sister, Jessa.

Caleb was an exception.

Max and Caleb were a year older than me, and Julian one year older than them. Unlike me, who ran cross-country and track all year round, since freshman year, Max only started running this year, as a way to stay in shape for baseball season. By the time I met Caleb, Julian was about to start his senior year, Max and Caleb were juniors, and I was a sophomore.

Julian grunted. “I wouldn’t pick Max for you, either.”

“Good thing you’re not picking, then.”

Julian had eventually warmed, in the only way it seemed he could manage. Distantly, and with a look of surprise whenever Caleb showed up—as if this detail of my life managed to slip his mind, every time.

I zip the bag back up and place it carefully inside the box, folding it in half, covering the polos. I look away as I close the lid. My blue dress from last year still hangs in my closet, in the plastic dry-cleaning bag, untouched. I missed Homecoming this year. It was last month, on a clear and crisp Saturday night. The dress I bought for it at the end of the summer (Hailey, pulling it off the rack, holding it up to me, her eyes shining. You have to get this, Jessa. It’s perfect. It’s perfectly you.) still has the tags.

I bought the dress because it was on sale, and because I was an optimist.

But even then, it felt like a lie. Like I was trying to recapture something between us that was already gone.