“Yeah. Me neither.”
“I know—?I’m sorry.”
I shrug, and his hands fall away from my shoulders. Unsaid words hang between us—?charges, belief, Hannah?—but I can’t bring myself to say any of them.
“I’ve got to go find Charlie.”
He nods. “Okay. Sure.”
“Hey.” I catch the sleeve of his navy sweater. “I’ll see you tonight.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. If my parents will let me.”
He smiles, a tiny thing. “Six thirty?”
I nod before walking toward the song tent. I don’t look back at Owen, but I can’t help but picture us sitting on the roof, faces turned toward the stars.
You know you pretty much have to marry Alex now, right? he’d say.
Why’s that?
He touched your shoulder—?that’s like a marriage proposal in my book. Plus, I can’t divide my loyalties. Very unfair.
Ah, yes, I forgot that my friendships are all about your comfort.
Damn straight. Plus, then I can just live with you guys in your basement and you can take care of me for life.
Dreams do come true.
That’s how it would go if all of this weren’t happening. If there weren’t all these lies and a stranger wearing my brother’s face between us.
The ache in my chest is so sharp it steals my breath. I want that imagined conversation to be real. I want a lifetime of teasing smiles under the stars. Our stars. But I’m starting to think that life is gone forever. Maybe it never really was. Maybe I lost it the second Mr. Knoll asked me to stay behind. Maybe that’s when I lost everything.
I keep walking, a million different thoughts and wishes trailing after me. Charlie comes into view and I pick up my pace.
She doesn’t see me at first. She’s perched on a stool behind a table, bent over a ball of gold yarn and brandishing her knitting needles, weaving the wool into a crimson lump. Her bottom lip is caught between her teeth and I see her mouth form the f-word as she unravels some unintended knot. She’s so damn cute that the fact that we haven’t talked in twenty-four hours fades to the back of my mind.
“Hey,” I say as I duck under the tent’s awning.
She startles, her knitting needles clattering onto the table, and her ball of yarn drops and rolls a few feet away.
“Hi,” she says. Then she’s in motion, picking up the needles and yarn and cramming the whole whatever-it-is she’s knitting into her bag. She stuffs her hands into her pockets and tries to smile. “Hey.”
“You okay?”
She nods. “Yeah. Just . . . I’m glad you’re here.”
Her gaze on me is so intense, her thoughts pretty much bleed out of her eyeballs.
“I’m fine,” I say before she can ask. “Really.”
“Yeah?”
I nod.
“You never texted me back,” she says.
