I want to talk to her. I want to run my hands through her hair. I want to feel her skin on mine, feel her heartbeat. It’s all so wrong, but at the same time, it feels like the only thing that’s right.
Zoe once asked me why I trust her with my secrets. I told her it’s because she’s real. Because she can make me feel something.
That hasn’t changed. I don’t want these damn feelings; they get me absolutely nowhere. But I can’t just turn them off either. The wall I’m hiding behind hasn’t just begun to crumble; Zoe completely decimated it with a single kiss.
Now it’s all back. The pain, the anger, missing her, and the fucking hope that I’ve tried to squash. The feeling of being completely alone in the world, even though I know I’m not.
My body can’t cope with it. It fights back. My heart beats too fast every time I think about Zoe. I’m restless. And I’m angry—at Zoe and Caleb, at my parents and Lia, and at the whole fucking world. Most of all at myself, because I simply can’t stay away from her.
A knock on my door snaps me out of my thoughts, and I think—I hope—that it’s Zoe. I rush to open it, but it’s just my sister. Her blond hair is in a neat braid, and there’s a serious expression in her green eyes.
“We need to talk, Jase.”
* * *
My sister isn’t usually able to catch me off guard. To be honest, I can’t ever remember her doing it. Maybe when she didn’t come to my graduation, but even that wasn’t really surprising. It was more of a confirmation of what I already knew.
But today she manages to throw me off balance.
“Are you fucking kidding me?” I say for the third time, still struggling to believe what she’s saying.
Lia stares daggers at me. “Can’t you put a sentence together without swearing?”
“I can, but not in this case.”
“You’re acting childish,” she says, groaning in annoyance.
“Good thing I’m your little brother, because that’s basically my job.” I’m frustrating the hell out of her, and considering the offer she just made me, I probably shouldn’t be. But I can’t help it. I’ve forgotten how to deal with Lia in a normal way.
She glares at me. “So? Do you want the money or not?”
Her perfectly manicured fingernails tap impatiently on the tabletop. We’ve been sitting in a little hipster café for about fifteen minutes. It’s just a few blocks from campus. Lia avoids my room like the plague, and I refused to go to hers.
But neither of us wanted an audience for this conversation, so rather than going to the hall or the cafeteria, we ended up here. Over a cup of the most disgusting coffee I’ve ever had, Lia offered to give me the tuition fee for this semester.
The offer is so absurd that I think my question is completely justified.
“Where did you get that kind of money anyway?” I lean back on my chair and cross my arms over my chest. Lia avoids my gaze, her hands cramping around her coffee cup.
“Lia,” I say sharply, “why do you have so much money that you can just give me thirteen thousand dollars?”
Her face is an expressionless mask that is painfully familiar to me. For a moment, it feels like I’m looking in the mirror.
“Grandma and Grandpa set up a college fund for each of us. Not for the tuition—they knew Mom and Dad had that covered—but just to make our college experiences... a little more comfortable.” She’s clearly reluctant to tell me about this, and as soon as my brain computes what she’s said, I almost wish she hadn’t.
I stare at her, nonplussed. “Grandma and Grandpa set up a college fund foreachof us?”
She nods.
“Why don’t I know anything about it?”
The answer is so simple, so goddamn obvious that I know the answer as soon as the question is out of my mouth. My parents aren’t the only ones who cut off my funds. I never thought of askingmy grandparents for help, but apparently, it wouldn’t have worked anyway.
Lia sighs. “You know why. Don’t force me to say it. Just take the money. It belongs to me; it’s my account. Dad won’t find out.”
It would be so easy just to say yes. It would be so stupid not to. But my pride sees things differently.
“Why do you want to help me?”
