“I don’t really remember my dad,” I said quietly. “He left when I was five. I remember he had this cologne that smelled like pine trees, and he used to whistle when he made pancakes. But I don’t remember the day he left. I just woke up one day and his stuff was gone.”
Darien didn’t say anything, but I could feel his eyes on me. It must be even harder for him to lose someone he had eleven years of memories with.
“I see him sometimes,” I added. “A couple times a year. Holidays, usually. He acts like I’m a guest. Like I’m… temporary. It’s not the same,” I admitted. “But I know what it feels like. Being scared someone might leave. Or already has.”
That heavy silence stretched between us again.
“I don't know if you'll lose them,” I added, “but you'll always have me. I'm not going anywhere.”
“Promise me, Tru. You have to swear it.”
The desperation in his voice worried me. “I swear it, Dare. You’re stuck with me forever.”
His voice came out rough. “What if it’s my fault?”
“It’s not.”
“How do you know?”
I swallowed past the knot in my tongue that tried to hold back the words I’d never admitted to anyone before. “Because I thought it was my fault too. For years. And it wasn’t. It just... wasn’t.”
Dare shifted under the blanket, maybe moving closer. “I don’t want things to change.”
“They already are,” I said softly, inching closer to the edge of the mattress. “But you’re not alone, Dare. You have me.”
Moonlight glinted in his eyes as he peered up at me. “Even if they split up and I have to move?” he asked.
“Even if the whole world splits up,” I whispered. “I’m not going anywhere.”
He didn’t say anything else. But a few minutes later, I heard him sniff. Just once. I didn’t mention it. He drifted off first, chest rising and falling easily, while I lay awake with the fan whispering overhead and the ceiling shifting in restless patches of dark.
I didn’t have a name for the feeling twisting in my chest, not then.
But I knew this much—I wanted to be the place he ran to when everything else came crashing down.
And I meant every word. Even if someday he forgot I ever said them.
The rest of our eleventh summer blurred into a string of perfect, ordinary moments.
We swam almost every afternoon, racing laps and launching cannonballs into the deep end until my mom brought out lemonade and frozen grapes. We rode bikes in lazy loops around the cul-de-sac, daring each other to pedal with no hands. There were endless soccer practices and games, junk food-fueled movie marathons, shared dinners, and sleepovers.
For a little while, it felt like maybe the world was holding steady. But just before sixth grade started, everything changed. At least, for Dare.
We were under the ramp again, our favorite spot, hiding from the sun. It was too hot to draw, too hot to dream, too hot to do anything but exist. A cicada buzzed nearby, loud and slow.
Dare picked at the splintered wood beside him. “I heard my dad yelling about my mom’s new boyfriend last night.”
I’d started calling him Dare a while back, not because anyone else did, but because it fit. He never said no to anything, never backed down from a challenge, even the dumb ones. That’s how I’d come to think of him, daring. Like the name had always been sitting there, waiting for someone to use it.
I jerked my head toward him, blinking hard. “Wait, what?”
He scoffed. “Apparently, she’s seeing someone already. She hasn’t even moved out yet. Isn’t that fucked?”
“Yeah,” I said quietly. “I can’t imagine.”
He nodded because he expected that. Dare whispered thenext words as if it were a secret. “I don’t think I’m gonna be able to live with her.”
My stomach twisted. “Why not?”
