“Go Birds,” he said softly, eyeing my jersey.
I couldn’t help myself—I smiled. Lifting my right hand, I curled my fingers into the familiar Cshape. “Fly high, Cardinals,” I said.
Graham’s smile widened, the corners of his eyes crinkling.
I fell into step beside him as we descended from the porch. I expected him to lead me toward his car parked along the curb, but we continued down the street instead.
“Where are we going?” I glanced sideways at him.
He raised his brows, his expression unreadable. “Well, we aren’t traveling all the way to OCU by ourselves.”
“We’re not?”
He shook his head as we crossed the quiet street. We were headed toward the library. It wasn’t far from the bed-and-breakfast, and as the outline of the old brick house came into view, my stomach flipped.
“There’s a bus that some of the locals take every year to the game,” Graham explained.
“A bus? What kind of bus?”
He shrugged, his mouth twitching. “You’ll see.”
We walked in silence the rest of the way, our breaths puffing white in the cold morning air. Annoyance tugged at me that he hadn’t mentioned we’d be traveling with other people, but I didn’t complain. I hadn’t been to an Ohio Central game in years.
Part of me ached for it—the noise, the energy, the sea of red and white—but another part, the wounded part, was afraid. The last time I’d gone, my brother had been beside me, yelling himself hoarse for the Cardinals.
Today, the memory of him felt so close, it almost hurt to breathe.
I gaped as we rounded the library and stepped into the back parking lot. The “bus” was a short school bus painted in OCU’s colors. The top half was bright red and the bottom was white.Bird Buswas scrawled across the side next to a grinning painting of Rudy the Cardinal. Flashing red and white lights blinked along the roof like it was leading a parade.
Graham’s quiet chuckle pulled my attention to him.
“It’s very…festive?” I said weakly, not sure that was the right word for the spectacle of school spirit idling in front of me.
The bus was already packed. Through the windows were shadows of people shifting, the sounds of singing and clapping along to the music that thumped from inside.
My steps faltered.
Graham’s chuckle faded into a tight frown. “You okay?”
My gaze darted back to the bus. The laughter, the faces I couldn’t yet make out, the sound of the fight song—it all made my chest ache. My heart rate pitched, the cold morning air suddenly too sharp and thin.
“It’s just…” I began, swallowing. “The locals. You know they don’t really like me.”
I forced my breathing to steady. It was tiring, always feeling like I had to be on guard in Ember Hollow, always aware of every glance and whisper.
I was the enemy in this town.
Graham’s expression darkened before he chased the shadows away. He reached out and took my hand—his was impossibly warm against my ice-cold fingers. He must’ve been keeping them in his pockets; the morning was freezing.
“Today, you’re not Quinn Carpenter, the defense lawyer,” he said gently, tugging me closer to the bus.
The noise grew louder, the OCU fight song spilling out of the open door in bright, chaotic bursts of sound.
“You’re a fellow Cardinals fan.” He nodded toward my jersey. “You’re one of us today.”
His confidence pulled a smile from me, though it was a small, cautious thing. “If you say so,” I murmured.
“Come on.”
