She didn't ask where the others were. She wasn't going to make it weird. She'd get coffee and go.
He kissed her once, then helped her sit up like it mattered that she didn't wobble.
Her hair was a disaster. Her dress was... somewhere. She was wearing someone's shirt, big enough to be Arthur's.
She looked like someone who'd had too much and not enough at the same time. Dream dust still clinging to her, wistful and grateful for something already slipping away.
The fever had broken.This was the thermometer reading normal again.
Mateo stood and offered his hand. "Come on. Let's get you fed."
April took it. Let him pull her to her feet. She reached for the book, tucked it under her arm like proof that last night had been real.
Breakfast. Coffee. Then she'd figure out how to get home. Maybe someone had left her dress somewhere.
Or she'd seen this, walk-of-shame hack video where you pulled the collar down around your chest and knotted the sleeves at your waist like a belt, and somehow made borrowed-shirt-morning-after look like a magazine spread. Arthur's shirt was certainly long enough to pass as a dress.
She could do that.
Probably.
They walked through the hallway together. The house quiet, that specific morning-after quiet where silence had a shape, like someone had taken all the noise from last night and packed it away in boxes and left only the outline of where it used to be.
They turned the corner.
Voices drifted down the hallway.
Multiple voices.
April stopped walking.
Wait.
She looked at Mateo. He was smiling like he'd been waiting for this exact moment.
April's heart kicked hard against her ribs.
She picked up speed, each step faster than the last, Mateo keeping pace beside her.
She stepped into the doorway and froze.
They were all still here.
Every single one of them.
[HER CHAOS]
[7:21 AM]
Mateo:She woke up.
Mateo:She thought everyone left.
Mateo:She asked me to stay.
Mateo:I did.
THIRTY ONE
