Charlotte took another step until she was beside me. “After that night—the night of the party—Tru came home a mess. Hewas shaking so hard I thought he’d break apart right there in my arms. He told me everything. Not because he wanted to get you in trouble, but because it was too much hurt for one boy to carry alone.”
I turned my head toward her, breath caught somewhere between guilt and disbelief. “He told you?”
She nodded, eyes glossy in the dim porch light. “He said he didn’t understand what happened, or why you shut him out afterward. But he needed to let it out. Needed someone to tell him he wasn’t crazy for missing you.”
A muscle jumped in my jaw. My hands curled into fists on the railing.
Charlotte’s eyes softened. “He wasn’t the only one who thought they lost you that day.”
The words were a slap in my face, straight through the armor I’d been wearing since I was thirteen. Or had I been born wearing that armor? Because sometimes it felt as if I’d been hiding behind it for a lifetime.
“It took me almost a whole year to realize I didn’t lose you,” she went on. “Because no matter what walls you build, Dare, you’ll always be family to me. All I had to do was wait patiently—and maybe wish on a hundred or so stars—and here you are again. Back under my roof, where you belong.”
Something cracked open in my chest then, quiet and small but deep enough to bleed. I tried to fight the sting behind my eyes, but it was no use.
Charlotte smiled, a stretch of lips that made it impossible not to return it, even if mine was crooked and reluctant.
Before I could find words, she reached for me, armswrapping around my shoulders. For a heartbeat, I stood stiff, every instinct screaming to pull away. But then I sank into it—into her warmth, her steady heartbeat, the faint scent of vanilla and sugar.
And for the first time in years, I didn’t feel like I had to hold myself together.
She squeezed tighter, murmuring against my shoulder, “Someday you might find yourself in a position to come clean too. To unburden yourself. When that day comes, I’ll be right here, with a hot cup of cocoa and a tight hug, ready to listen.”
The lump in my throat was impossible to swallow. I nodded against her hair, unable to speak, barely breathing.
Her arms lingered a moment longer before she pulled back, brushing her thumb under my eye like she might catch a tear I wouldn’t let fall.
“Good,” she whispered, giving my shoulder one last squeeze. “Then it’s settled. Be good to Tru. No bullying under my roof. You need him, Dare. More than you may realize or let yourself admit. He needs you too.”
She turned toward the door, leaving me there on the porch, alone with the sound of dripping rain and the weight of her words.
CHAPTER 13
TRU
The cruelest heartbreak isn’t being left behind—it’s being looked at like you were never worth staying for.
The hallway buzzedwith end-of-period energy. Sneakers squeaked, locker doors slammed, and someone shouted across the corridor about lunch plans. I kept my head down, focused on the open-book math quiz waiting for me next period, and tried to summon some kind of calm. My locker gave its usual metallic groan when I spun the combination and wrenched open the door. The scent of paper and graphite wafted out, familiar but somehow suffocating. I snatched the book, hugged it to my chest like a shield, and stepped back.
The temperature in the hallway dropped considerably, as if someone had opened a door to winter. Darien stood there, looming, looking like an angry god who’d made hating me his personal creed. He didn’t just carry the grudge;he worshipped it. Lived by it. And judging by the look in his eyes, he was devout as hell.
I slammed the door hard, and the echo that reverberated down the hall was almost satisfying. His posture was casual, one shoulder propped against the row of lockers, arms folded like this was just another Tuesday. But his eyes told a different story. Hard. Calculating. Mean.
“That Tanner kid says you begged to suck his dick.”
He said it like a weather report. Like he wasn’t detonating my entire existence right there in front of everyone.
I blinked. Swallowed. My pulse pounded in my ears as I clutched my math book tighter to my chest as if it could block the words from landing.
Ignore him. Don’t rise to the bait. Don’t give him what he wants.
I turned to leave, shouldering past him with the kind of solid, deliberate hit you aim to feel. It rattled through me, bone deep, like I needed proof I could still hurt back.
“Answer me, dammit,” he barked louder, his voice echoing down the corridor like I owed him something. I didn’t owe him shit.
“Truen,” he persisted. His voice was cold and sharp. I was Truen now, not Tru. Not someone he pretended to know intimately.
I turned, jaw clenched. “Is what true,Dare?” I said his name with emphasis, reminding him that we had been on a nickname basis at one time.
