I shrug, attempting casual. “I didn’t have a choice. Leo rigged the…”
Tess’s eyes narrow slightly, but not at Leo. At me. “You had a choice,” she corrects. “You could’ve said no and walked off. You didn’t. I’m proud of you, Gwen.”
My chest tightens again. Annoying.
“I hate that you’re right,” I mutter.
“I know,” Tess says, her smile small but warm. “It’s my best quality.”
I snort. “Your best quality is bullying me into emotional growth.”
“Someone has to,” she says. Then, gently, “You were not a joke out there.”
I blink. “I fell.”
“You fell,” she agrees. “And you got up. And you didn’t freeze. And you didn’t laugh like you were begging people to laugh with you.”
That makes my stomach flip.
I look away. “I always laugh.”
“I know,” Tess says. “But tonight… it wasn’t that laugh.”
I swallow, my throat burning a little. “What laugh was it?”
Tess studies me. “The one that’s actually you. Not the one you put on, so no one can hurt you first.”
My chest tightens painfully.
I manage, “Ok, therapist.”
Tess smiles. “I’m not a therapist. I’m a baker. We have good instincts because dough doesn’t lie.”
I laugh quietly because that’s Tess; she makes sincerity sound like a fact.
Leo returns then, keys in hand, smug again. “My chariot awaits,” he announces, gesturing to his car like he’s a prince.
Tess rolls her eyes. “Get in, Your Majesty.”
As we drive, the city lights blur past the windows, streaks of gold and white against the dark. The heater blasts, thawing my fingers and my cheeks. Tess sits in the passenger seat, scrolling through something on her phone, probably bakery-related, because Tess’s brain is basically a spreadsheet with a soul.
Leo drives like he owns the road.
I sit in the back and press my forehead to the cool glass for half a second, letting the car’s vibration ground me.
I tell myself to stop thinking. It doesn’t work. Because the moment my eyes close, I see the ice again. Not the fall. His hand. The way he offered it was like a question, not a demand. The way his eyes stayed on mine instead of flicking toward the crowd, like he was checking who was watching.
By the time I get home, my knee is stiff, my cheeks are warm from the car heat, and my brain is exhausted from trying to process a human interaction that shouldn’t matter and absolutely does.
I kick off my shoes at the door and hobble toward my couch like an elderly woman with opinions.
My apartment is small, warm, and quiet. It smells faintly of vanilla because I used a candle last week to make myself feel like I have my life together.
It did not work.
I collapse onto the couch and stare at the ceiling.
My phone buzzes.
