Elias did that to me.
"Different how?"
"I don't know. I was lighter. I used to wake up happy and write poetry, which seems really fucking stupid now. But I've been on the defensive for two years now, and I never stopped long enough to realize how exhausting it is."
"Maybe that was taking care of yourself at the time."
"I just don't want to feel anything anymore. I'm so fucking tired of it."
I hear footsteps in the hallway upstairs and then on the staircase. They're going to find us, eventually.
Fortunately, it sounds like the next place he looks is in the backyard.
"Do you love Dax?" I ask.
"Umm…yeah."
"Does he love you?"
Nolan sighs, thinking it over. "I think…maybe Dax's brain works a little differently than mine. But I know he cares; that doesn't make him a bad person."
"How does his brain work?"
"Like…he's always chasing a high. A dopamine hit. I think he has a hard time understanding value…and consequences."
Great. So, the person who knows him best, who loves him, doesn't think he's capable of loving someone else, either.
"How does yours work?"
"Violently."
This time when the door opens, it's not just a crack. Dax swings the door wide enough that I can see the light from the hallway coming through the comforter over my head, and I know he must notice us this time.
"What the hell?!" Footsteps approach the bed before Dax rips the covers back. "That's just fucking rude. I expect it from Ripley, but not you, Nolan."
He lies on the bed next to me, draping an arm around my waist. "Are you mad at me or something?"
"No." It isn'texactlya lie. I'm not mad at him; it's just...
I let my guard down. And then Elias fucked with my head.
"Well, then why won't you text me back?"
"What are you talking about? You didn't text me."
"Yeah, I did. I texted you quite a few times, actually—a really embarrassing wall of at least five unanswered messages, and I feel really uncool even thinking about it."
"You must have sent them to someone else. I didn't get anything."
"No," he insists. "I sent them to you. I wanted to take you to lunch, and then when you didn't answer I got worried. Then, I brought it up to Elias at the gym, and he said that you were fine and that you had lunch with him, so…that kinda hurt, too."
"What?" I crinkle my nose and roll over to face him. "Unless you count yelling at each other in the quad around noon ashaving lunch,I did not have lunch with Elias."
Why the hell would he even say that?
Dax pulls his phone from his pocket and opens our text chain. Sure enough, there are several unanswered messages from him.
But that's not what draws my attention—it's his phone background. He really did change it to the shitty selfie he took of us at the café the other day.
