“Gross.” I wrinkle my nose. “I don’t need to know your porn stats, thanks.”
I go to smack him, a knee-jerk move I’ve been doing since we were kids. But he catches my hand and presses it against his chest, right over his heart. I feel the steady thud of it beneath my palm—and it’s racing quick and dangerously.
“Just tell me,” he says, voice low, “that it’s still you and me against the world.”
The words hit like a knife in the center of my chest.
Because itwasjust us. Always. Two dirty kids playing house in the dark, teaching each other how to survive when the adults gave up. He knows which lies get you out of trouble, which windows never lock, and which ribs to avoid when you hug someone covered in bruises.
He’s the closest thing I’ve ever had to family.
But looking at him now—raw and desperate and trying so hard to rewind the clock—I see it for what it is.
Not safety. Not love.
I think… I think maybe it’s a trap shaped like loyalty.
Still, I don’t know how to hurt him. He was there when everyone else let me down. So I nod, the lie like broken glass in my throat. “Of course it is.”
And maybe it used to be. Maybe it still is, in some way that matters.
But I’m not that girl anymore.
Or maybe I’m just trying not to be.
I don’t know. It feels like I don’t know anything most of the time.
All I know is that the truth—therealtruth—is pushing at the edges of me like a scream. So I add, quietly, “But we’re gonna grow up someday, Z. Peopledochange. Maybe not Silas. But… things… change.I’llchange.”
I don’t know if I’m trying to convince him or myself.
Because after graduation, Caleb will be gone. Off to Harvard or Yale or wherever golden boys go to chase their destinies. I know him saying he’ll take me with him is a pipedream. I’ll just be a story he tells someone someday. That one time he slept with the wrong girl. Hisstepsister. All the other guys in his frat will laugh and clink red cups with him and slap him on the back.
I’ll be a fucking punchline in a story that ends in a picket fence with someone else.
“I won’t change,” Z says, squeezing my hand like a promise and a threat. “I’ll always be the same Z. Now and forever. You know that, right? No matter what happens.”
And maybe that’s the scariest part.
Because maybe hewillalways be the same. And maybe… oh god, maybe I will, too. Just like my mom, after all.
“Hey, guys.”
Caleb’s voice cuts through the dark like a thunderclap.
I leap back like I’ve been electrocuted, ripping myhand from Z’s grip. My heart slams against my ribs in panic.
Caleb stands at the edge of the porch, hands shoved deep in his pockets.
Even in the dark, I can see the rigid set of his shoulders. The way he’s standing perfectly still—too still. Like a spring wound so tight it’s about to snap.
His face is blank. But his eyes…
His eyes—There’s fire behind them. Not jealousy. Not yet.
But there’s clearly possession.
My stomach twists.