He laughs. Low. Warm. “I doubt that.”
I try to hold eye contact. I really do.
But his gaze feels steady. Confident. Like he’s not intimidated. Like he’s not scrambling for approval. And that — that’s new.
“So,” he says, “if this is no longer a date…” He pauses just long enough to make me aware of it. “…maybe it’s an opportunity.”
“For what?” I ask.
“To see if you’re actually as unimpressed as you’re pretending to be.”
Mia makes a choking sound behind me. I feel heat climb up my neck. “I’m not pretending anything,” I say.
He raises an eyebrow.
“Good,” he says. “I’d hate to think you were playing hard to get.”
“And what if I am?”
His smile deepens. “Then I’d enjoy the game.”
Oh. Okay. So this is who he is. Confident. Teasing. Just enough edge to feel dangerous without being arrogant. And the worst part? I’m smiling.
I closed my eyes to let the memory fade.
***
I’m standing on the sidewalk. Cold air against my skin. And upstairs, he’s looking at her. The same dark blue eyes. The same mouth parting in pleasure.
The spark at Moonlit Bar. The laugh. The first drink I bought him. The way I stayed. All of it is just a prequel. Because that look? It was never just mine. It also belonged to whoever was in front of him.
I inhale sharply. And I realize that the beginning wasn’t fate. It was just the first lie.
I keep walking. The gravel crunches too loud under my shoes. The night air smells like cut grass and someone’s laundry detergent drifting from an open dryer vent.
A dog barks two houses down. Laughter spills from somewhere, normal, unaware, cruel in its normalcy. I fixate on it.
The flicker of Mrs. Alden’s porch light. The uneven crack in the sidewalk I always step over. The distant whir of a car turning the corner. If I can catalog it all, every smell, every sound, every stupid, ordinary detail, maybe I won’t have to replay what I just saw upstairs.
Blonde hair. His hands.
I swallow hard and keep walking past the mailbox, past the neighbor’s porch light. Past the version of my life I thought I had. My phone is in my hand. I don’t remember taking it out. It feels foreign. Too bright against the dark.
And then it rings. Her name flashes across the screen.
My sister.
I stop on the sidewalk. The only person who has ever seen me ugly-cry. The only person who sat on the bathroom floor with me the night Mom died and didn’t try to fix anything.
My throat tightens. I blink once. Twice. The tears spill anyway. It’s not dramatic or loud, just steady, quiet, and unavoidable. I wipe them away like I can erase this too and answer.
“Hey,” she says. And the silence between us cracks. She knows. She always knows. “What happened?”
My voice doesn’t sound like mine. It sounds far away. Detached. Like I left my body back in the bedroom doorway. “He’s been cheating on me.”
A car drives by slowly. The porch light hums. Somewhere, a screen door slams shut. And I stand there cataloging it all . The smells, the sounds, the stupid rhythm of a neighborhood that hasn’t changed, because if I stop focusing on it, I’ll have to feel it.
And this time, when the world ends,
