Brianna R. Shrum - The Liars Guide to the Night Sky: A Novel

Copyright 2020 by Brianna R. Shrum

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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the products of the authors imagination or used fictitiously.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available on file.

Cover design by Daniel Brount

Cover photo credit: Getty Images

Print ISBN: 978-1-5107-5780-6

Ebook ISBN: 978-1-5107-5781-3

Printed in the United States of America

PRAISE FOR BRIANNA R. SHRUM

Kissing Ezra Holtz (and Other Things I Did for Science)

Realistic and will resonate with many teens. Give this to readers who love witty, humorous love stories mixed with STEM. Booklist

Predictable hate-becomes-love romance is given new life by an inclusive cast.... Worth picking up. Kirkus Reviews

The Art of French Kissing

Fun, flirty, foodie, and filled with way more heat than your average kitchen, The Art of French Kissing has all the ingredients for a perfect summer romance! Dahlia Adler, author of Behind the Scenes

I ate up this hate-to-love-and-back-again romance! If you love Top Chef but wish more of the show was focused on the romance and rivalries behind the scenes, youll eagerly devour The Art of French Kissing. Like the best sweet and savory pastries, Carter and Reid deliver both sugar and spice. Amy Spalding, author of The Summer of Jordi Perez (and the Best Burger in Los Angeles)

This meet-cute romance stands out thanks to the nuanced characters and subtle treatment of bigger issues such as race, gender, and money (Carters family flirts with poverty).... A thoughtful and delicious romance. Kirkus Reviews

How to Make Out

An addictive mix of heart, humor, and hot. How to Make Out is the perfect lesson in how to fall in love with YA romance. Gina Ciocca, author of Last Years Mistake

How to write a seriously addictive book? Mission accomplished. Smart, hilarious, and un-put-down-able, How to Make Out will capture readers hearts. Laurie Elizabeth Flynn, author of Firsts

Full of humor, heart, and some serious chemistry, How to Make Out is a fun and romantic read with dynamic characters I wont soon forget. Chantele Sedgwick, author of Love, Lucas

This is a story with an obvious lesson to it, but the lesson is delivered in an entertaining manner and will be an easy sell to teen girls. VOYA Magazine

This laugh-out-loud coming-of-age novel engages readers immediately and never lets go... School Library Journal

ALSO BY BRIANNA R. SHRUM

Never, Never

How to Make Out

The Art of French Kissing

Kissing Ezra Holtz (and Other Things I Did for Science)

For my cousins.

We all know the place to be has always been wherever the cousins are hanging out.

CONTENTS

ITS NOT THE COLD of everything around us that gets to me in these last five minutesits the heat building in me.

The way my mind races hot and fast, knowing theres no way out of this cave.

The warmth that spreads through my body against the furious wind outside, the snowy walls of this makeshift denwarmth that feels a whole lot like those last hazy seconds before sleep.

The smoke and red in Jonah Ramirezs eyes when he grabs my jaw and says through clenched teeth, Dont. Hallie Jacob, if you give up on me now, if you leave me alone up here, I will never fucking forgive you.

I blink.

Slow.

Breathe.

One Mississippi.

Snow and wind beating against the trees, the ground, everything, everything.

Two Mississippi.

Lightning, flash against a tree, snap and crackle and the clean stench of burning wood. They call it thundersnow, not that that matters now.

Three.

Three.

I breathe the cold into my lungs.

It all feels like ice. But touch it long enough, and ice starts to feel like fire.

I brush my hand over Jonahs knuckles on my jaw.

The world lights up like a flare.

CHAPTER ONE

IT ISNT THAT I dont want to be here, as much as it is that if the devil were to show up at these hipster-ass crossroads in horn-rimmed glasses and a waxed moustache and happen to offer me transport out in exchange for my soul, Id take it.

I dont hate Colorado, I dont hate ski slopes, I dont even hate the sharp-toothed bite of the cold in my calves, the numb in my toes. I almost like the way it hurts when I sit by the fire in the lodge and ice-pick feeling returns to the frozen items I used to call fingers. It prickles, it hurts, but it makes me feel like life is returning to pieces of me. So no, I dont really hate any of it.

Its just that, god, I loved Massachusetts. I hate that I even think it past tense, like Oh, right! Massachusetts died. I dont lov ed it. I do still love it. If I close my eyes, I can still smell the bright crisp fog off the Connecticut River, clinging to my clothes when I strayed a little too close to the water.

I shut them tight, but not so tight that it doesnt dissipate in an instant.

Here, outside this ski lodge, it smells like weed. Like skunk rot and smoke.

And well. You know what they say.

Where theres smoke? Theres Jonah.

I can hear him laughing over all the rest of themwho knows how many of my cousins and their significant others and their who-knows-whoevers. I want to go find them.

I want to distract myself with what theyre smoking. I want to know what it is Jonahs laughing about so loud, but Im not really allowed. I dont know how intensely your parents can really ground you two months out from eighteen, but if Im hanging out alone in the dark anywhere Jonah Ramirez is, and I come back into the suite smelling like weed, Ill find out.

My parents are kind of assholes about my dads brothers kidsJolie and Jaxon (maddening, the same-letter-first-name thing. Thank god they stopped at two). Everyone knows its more about the super Family Drama on the CW history between my dad and my uncle than it is about Jolie and Jaxon. But my cousins have given my parents enough reasons, I guess, for them to feel okay about being total jerks. Jolie is cool but a little artsy, a little follow-your-heart, a little vegan for their tastes. And Jaxon, well. Jaxon is a fucking disaster.

I like him because he always shows up to family gatherings in clothes that are super politically inflammatory and his hair is always cut weird and different and he always finds me and talks to me like he cares what I think about anything. He drops f-bombs too loud and has too many tattoos, and the same shit I think is great about Jaxon Jacob is the same shit my parents cant stand about him.