I stand there for a long moment, staring at the hallway where Sloane vanished, feeling the ache of wanting her like it’s a physical thing lodged under my ribs.
Because it’sSloane.
She’ll strip herself of comfort before she lets anyone else go without it.
Even me.
Even when she’s angry.
Even when she swears she doesn’t have space.
I exhale slowly, then limp back to the living room couch and reset the ice pack on my knee.
And somewhere down the hall, behind a closed door, Sloane Rhodes is pretending she doesn’t care.
But I’m starting to learn her tells.
So maybe she’s wrong.
Maybe she does have space.
She’s just terrified of what could happen if she admits that to herself.
21
SLOANE
Two weeks can change a body.
Not in the dramatic way people pretend happens in movies—where someone wakes up and everything is suddenly different, clean-cut and obvious.
It’s quieter than that.
It’s a looser sweatshirt hanging on shoulders it used to fit. It’s hands that shake a little when they reach for a mug. It’s a face that still tries to smile, but the muscles don’t quite cooperate the same way they used to, like the effort costs more than it should.
It’s a walker sitting by the front door like a stranger that moved in and never asked permission.
And it’s February—close enough to Valentine’s Day that campus is choking on pink balloons and heart-shaped everything—while my birthday sits on the calendar like it’s supposed to mean something.
Like it’s supposed to be normal.
Jade rips a strip of athletic tape off with her teeth and glares at me like she can physically bully me into a better mood.
“Don’t do the spiral face,” she says.
“I’m not doing a spiral face,” I lie, tightening my ponytail.
Blakely, seated on the bench beside her, laces up her shoes slower than either of us, calm in the way that makes me feel both seen and slightly exposed. “You are,” she says gently.
I blow out a breath and stare at my locker like the metal can hold my thoughts in place.
The locker room smells like sweat and peppermint gum and the sharp, clean bite of disinfectant. The kind of smell that usually grounds me—routine, repetition, muscle memory.
Today it just feels like background noise to the loudest thought in my head:
Please let him make it.
Jade nudges my knee with hers. “He’s coming, right?”
