I shook my head, a reluctant smile tugging at my mouth. “Don’t get used to the nickname.”
“Too late,” she said cheerfully. “I changed your contact.”
“Please don’t,” I said, but there was no bite in it.
“Already done,” she said. “Non-negotiable.”
My phone chimed with a screenshot, showing my name now replaced withCowboy ??.
I couldn’t help but stare at it longer than necessary. My thumb brushed over the cowboy emoji almost absentmindedly, and a warmth spread low and slow in my chest.
I sighed. “What am I going to do with you, Counselor?”
“Appreciate my sense of humor,” she said.
That one pulled a laugh out of me. “Guess I don’t really have a choice.”
Our call drifted after that, moving from the heavy topics to the ordinary details that somehow felt more intimate. I asked about her day, figuring I could keep things light by focusing the conversation on her.
She told me about a brutal morning in the public defender’s office, describing a client who’d finally caught a break, howsometimes it felt like swimming upstream, and other times, like she couldn’t imagine doing anything else. She let a hint of pride slip in, admitting the wins kept her going. There was a softness in her voice when she talked about her job.
Then she talked about Cami, how they’d been inseparable since high school, how some friendships didn’t need maintenance because they were built into you. She laughed when she told me about the plans she and Harper had for the next day, already plotting breakfast, dance practice, and something involving slime that I chose not to ask follow-up questions about.
Every so often, she tried to turn the conversation back on me.
“So what about you?”
“How’s work really?”
“Are you even sleeping?”
I redirected every time. Asked another question. Let her keep talking, because it felt safer that way.
I had no intention of letting her in, anymore than I had. I’d already slipped enough. She’d be gone when I got home in a few weeks, back to her life, her job, her world. Getting attached, allowing her more into our world that I already had to, felt like a mistake I didn’t have the luxury of making.
The digital clock on the bedside table cast a faint glow, an ever-present reminder of minutes slipping by. Somewhere along the way, I stopped checking the time. When I finally glanced at the clock, it read 9:57 pm. Her voice had softened, words stretching slightly at the edges, that warm, sleepy cadence settling in.
We said our goodbyes slowly, like neither of us were quite ready to be the one to hang up.
“And Logan?”
“Yeah?”
“I like the accent,” she said. “Just so you know… And the way you say my name, especially when you’re tired.”
Something about that made me want to keep talking, just to please her. That feeling alone felt dangerous.
“Night, Counselor,” I said, my voice rougher than before.
“Night, cowboy.”
The call ended, but I stayed there for a long moment, phone in my hand, chest tight in a way that wasn’t unpleasant.
I didn’t know when I’d let her see that much of me; I just knew she’d made it feel easy.
I set the phone down beside me and stared at the wall, jaw tight, heart doing something it hadn’t done in a long time. This girl and her nicknames, her brightness, the light she seemed to carry within her, would be the death of me.
And that scared the hell out of me.
