She turns fully toward me now, knees pulled up, attention locked in but gentle. Her face falls as the realization hits her. “So—Cam and Leyley’s death?—”
I nod, not really sure how to handle all of this being drugged back up, but also I nod. “Hit harder than I’d like to admit.”
“And your brother?” There’s a gentle tilt to her head as she looks at me, her hand reaching over to my knee to give it a gentle squeeze, to just let me know I’m here.
“Sam was two,” I say. “Too young to understand what ‘gone’ really meant. Old enough to ask where Mommy and Daddy were and why they weren’t coming to tuck him into bed.”
I swallow, jaw tightening. “The state didn’t want to split us up, but I was suddenly a legal adult with no plan, no money, and a kid who needed breakfast, and homework help, and someone to make sure he brushed his teeth. So I said yes before anyone could talk me out of it.”
Hazel’s hand drifts over, resting lightly on my forearm, It’s not suffocating, just there to tell me that she cares, and is listening to me, and nothing I’ve said scares her.
“I grew up fast,” I say quietly. “Or at least I stopped letting myself be young. Michigan wasn’t glamorous. Cold winters, bad roads, long shifts. I worked whatever I could get—mechanic shops, warehouses, security—big emphasis on security, hencewhen I started doing the hacking thing—anything that paid and didn’t ask questions.”
“And Sam?” she asks.
“He turned out better than me,” I say with a faint smile. “Smarter. Kinder. Still believes the world isn’t actively trying to chew him up. Had a harder time with life than he lets on. He has some issues with prescription drugs; he got hurt during a soccer game and the doctors gave him some stuff that…” I grit my teeth. Talking about all of this really makes me realize all I’ve truly done is go back on my word for everyone I’ve ever known. “He got addicted to pain meds, and he struggled with it for a while. It was a scary time for me, and he’s finally doing better. He’s actually thinking about going to college, and I just know I don’t want him to follow in my footsteps.”
She huffs softly. “You know he worships the ground you walk on, right?”
I glance at her, amused. “He hates me.”
“Baby, I promise you he doesn’t,” she says. “He sees it as you saved him. He sees it as you gave up your whole life for him. ”
Needing the conversation, I stare out toward the open road in front of us. The road stretches on, familiar and foreign at the same time, and I let myself keep going before the courage disappears. “Cameron and I met in Michigan. Actually the same group that you and Leyla met at. I was a counselor for a while, and the whole time I was going through school. I took time off after my parents died, but again working with that group wasn’t my full time job. I could just tell that he was a good kid, we had something that didn’t really make sense. We were unlikely friends.
“He was just a kid, but he stuck by me. Once I got my full time job, I moved out to Nashville with Sammy. I was twenty-five at that time and Cameron was eighteen. He was making his name for himself; Cam was younger, already neck-deep in social work,consulting for this company that he figured was doing some shady shit, and that thought they were untouchable. Next thing I know, I was fixing a security flaw for a company that didn’t want to admit it had one.”
“Let me guess,” Hazel says. “You proved them wrong.”
“Violently,” I reply dryly, a smirk creeping up over my face. “Cameron liked that.”
I tell her about late nights hunched over screens in cheap apartments, about arguing over coffee that tasted like regret, about the first time someone looked at my work and didn’t just see utility, but intention. Cameron wasn’t a savior. He didn’t rescue me from anything. He just saw me. Treated me like an equal before I felt like one.
“He taught me to think in negative space,” I say. “What isn’t there matters as much as what is. Especially when people want you to stop looking.”
Hazel nods slowly. “Which is why this—Philly—feels right.”
“Exactly,” I say. “Cameron doesn’t vanish unless he’s boxed in. And Leyla? She doesn’t stop unless stopping is the point. I’m starting to think those journals were planted there to throw us off.”
We fall quiet again, the weight of it settling in but not crushing. Hazel leans back, her gaze forward now, her expression thoughtful but still bright around the edges.
“Thank you for telling me,” she says after a moment. “I know that wasn’t easy.”
I shrug. “Didn’t feel…impossible.”
She grins. “High praise.”
I laugh, shaking my head, and feel something shift inside me. Something old loosening its grip. The past doesn’t hurt less because I say it out loud, but it feels less like it owns me.
The city signs start to appear in the distance; blue, and white, and inevitable.
Philly is coming. So is the truth.
Hazel taps the dashboard. “Okay,” she says, rallying. “When we get there, we need food, coffee, and a plan that doesn’t involve you brooding in silence.”
“I don’tbrood,” I say again. She’s really trying to pull something out of me, and I know it’s not the smartest idea, but I gave her my whole life on a platter, and I feel like I finally did something right with this—this woman who I’m starting to realize isn’t just someone who I have no connection to. I’m starting to realize that she may just be it for me.
She arches a brow. “You just trauma-monologued. You’re allowed to brood a little.”
