“After,” I echoed, the promise heavy, “we can go back to being us.”
Chloe closed the gap again, a soft quick press before she was gone. Inches that might as well be miles.
“Maybe there is something to this luck thing.” I twirled the bracelet around my finger. “I’ve gottenverylucky in this competition.”
“I tried to tell you,” she replied, a forced smile on her lips. “But you never listen.”
How could I tell her that I was beginning to suspect that it wasn’t a bracelet strung on a stormy day? But the person who’d brought it all together.
I slipped it over my hand, feeling as if it was an anchor more than a good luck charm, keeping us grounded. Like it was a physical manifestation of everything we had promised each other.
Chloe pushed her bracelet over her knuckles, and I was looking at the door when I heard a sharp snap. Time seemed to stand still as the elastic string split, the beads exploded outwards, flying through the air and scattering across the locker-room floor like tiny fragments of shrapnel.
For a second, neither of us moved. The silence was deafening, punctuated only by the faint clatter of a final bead skittering to a stop.
Our eyes met, hers wide with shock, as all hell broke out.
43
Inés
Punisher—Phoebe Bridgers
“Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.” Chloe dropped to her knees, her hands scrambling over the floor, trying to pull all the beads together.
My hands met the cold tiles, trying my best to scoop up every bead I could.
“It’s okay. We can fix it. We can tie the string back together,” I stuttered. I already knew it was impossible, they had scattered everywhere, under benches, in tiny crevices, but I scrambled alongside her anyway.
There was a knock on the door. Mallory’s voice echoed through the locker room. “Are you ready?”
“WE NEED A MINUTE!” we both yelled, our voices raw and frantic. Collapsing onto the bench, we dumped the beads into a shared pile. Chloe’s trembling hands found the snapped elastic, and we began threading them back on with the urgency of people trying to disarm a bomb.
“It’s going to be okay,” I tried to reassure her. “It’s only a bracelet, it’s nothing.”
“Youliterallysaid you were beginning to believe it,” she ground out, her fingers still shaking as she tried to string another bead on.
“The irony is not missed on me, but it was a joke,” I admitted.
“This is not a joking matter.”
“I know. I’m sorry.”
With all the salvaged beads strung together, Chloe laid her hand out along my lap. Carefully, I tried to tighten the string around, attempting to leave some room for movement.
Another knock. Louder this time. “Wereallyhave to go!”
“Hold on!” I yelled back, my focus glued to the not-long-enough string. With a shaky breath, I managed to knot the elastic. It wasn’t pretty, hardly more than a lopsided loop, but it held, the tension tight against her skin.
“Too tight?” I asked, glancing up at her.
“It’s fine,” she said, but her worried gaze clung to mine. Her lip caught between her teeth, and for a moment, she looked as scared as I felt. “Do you still think it’s lucky?”
I laughed, sharp and bitter. The sound echoed in the tiled room. “It doesn’t matter what I think. It’s not about luck or bracelets.” I took her hand in mine, holding it steady. “What matters is that you believe you can do this. And you know I believe in you.”
Her hand found mine, squeezing three times. Some might have thought that meantthose three words.The ones I felt in their entirety for her but hadn’t yet committed to speech. But I knew they meant something else. Threeotherwords.
Let’s fucking go.
