Pepper informs the class that they need one more person for the Oakhurst Quizbowl team. Pepper has Max switch seats with Ryan who has spent too much time talking with his buddy, Tyler. However, the seating arrangement doesn't last long, before Ms. Pepper seats Ryan just behind Paige, making her very happy to be so near her crush. In Honors English, Ryan is there with his cousin, Max Watson who had been attending a private school, Coventry School. Paige's junior year starts with her learning from her friend Morgan Sullivan that Ryan broke up with girlfriend Leanne Woods over the summer. The last item on the list, Paige is certain she never wants to do again. Parties/social events, 2.New group, 3.Date, 4. After talking with her Grammy who is suffering from short term memory loss, Paige is inspired to draw up a list that includes 1. With summer holidays coming to an end, she decides to plan out a great year, hoping that she can fake her way 'through every step until things were truly good again.' Her best friend Tessa McMahon suggests that Paige try to rejoin some of the groups she was a part of in freshman year. Paige has just finished her therapy and she now has to cope on her own.

They discover they share a class in Honors English. She realizes that he understands what she's been going through, the sympathy from complete strangers since his sister was sick with cancer.

Paige encounters Ryan Chase, a boy she has had a crush on since forever, in Alcott's Books and Beans. In her school where everyone is defined by something, she is known as 'the Girl Whose Boyfriend Died'. Paige has spent the last year attempting to come to terms with his death. A year earlier, Paige's first ever boyfriend, Aaron Rosenthal, whom she dated for a grand total of two months, died in a swimming accident. Paige Hancock lives in Oakhurst, Indiana with her mother and her younger sister, Cameron.

At it's heart is a tender story, well told of a friendship blossoming unexpectedly into a first love. The Start of Me and You is a story about a young girl struggling to come to terms with the death of a friend while learning to live again.

The Start of Me and You by Emery Lord