I stared at the trees, trying to get my breathing under control. My skin was still tingling where he'd touched me. I could still feel the ghost of his arms around my shoulders, the warmth of his chest against my cheek.
I wanted it back. That was the terrifying part. I wanted to crawl back into his arms and stay there until everything else faded away.
Which was exactly why I couldn't.
"You requested the schedule changes," I said. "Didn't you."
James went still.
"Twilson mentioned it. Someone asking about rearranging my classes." I turned to look at him. "That was you."
He didn't deny it. Didn't try to explain it away. Just met my eyes with that steady, stubborn gaze.
"Yeah," he said. "That was me."
"Why?"
"Because I wanted to see you more." Simple. Direct. Like it was the most obvious thing in the world. "I asked if there was flexibility in my schedule. They said yes. So I adjusted."
"You didn't think to ask me first?"
"Would you have said yes?"
I opened my mouth. Closed it.
"That's what I thought." He wasn't smug about it. If anything, he looked a little sad. "I know you're trying to keep distance. I'm not stupid, Lumi. I can feel you pulling away every time I get close. But I can also feel—" He stopped, frustrated. "I don't know how to explain it. There's something here. Between us. And I'm not going to pretend there isn't just because it's inconvenient."
The hum was a roar now, drowning out everything else. My body remembered his arms, his warmth, his scent. My body wanted more.
"You don't understand," I said.
"Then explain it to me."
"I can't."
"Can't or won't?"
"Does it matter?"
He shifted toward me, and I flinched back before I could stop myself. If he touched me again—if he pulled me close again—I didn't trust myself not to fall. Not to give in completely to whatever this thing was between us.
He noticed. Of course he noticed. He stilled, keeping his hands carefully at his sides.
"Yeah," he said quietly. "It matters. Because 'can't' means there's something stopping you, and maybe I can help. 'Won't' means you've already decided, and I'm just..." He trailed off. "I don't know. Wasting my time."
"Maybe you are."
The words came out harder than I meant them to. I saw them land—watched the flinch he tried to hide, the way his jaw tightened.
Good. This was good. Push him away. Make him leave. Stop this before it becomes something you can't control.
But my chest hurt. And my eyes were burning again. And the hum was screaming at me, furious and desperate, like I was cutting off a limb.
"Twilson is watching me," I said. The words tumbled out before I could stop them. "He made that clear today. Every move I make, every connection I have—he's going to use it. Weaponize it. You saw what he did with Rae, with Vince. He took things that were mine and turned them into evidence of... I don't know. Corruption. Favoritism. Something that makes me look like a problem."
James was listening. Really listening, the way he always did—like my words were worth something, like I was worth something.
"If he sees us together," I continued, "if people start talking about the new girl and the cowboy who rearranged his whole schedule to follow her around—that's ammunition. That's another thing he can twist. Another weakness he can exploit."
