So yeah, if I were building a perfect match for Coralie on some mental whiteboard—Theo would be the obvious answer.
He said so himself.
It was after the Backdoor Shootout on the North Shore. We all went to eat, crowded around a too-small table with barely enough room for the chaos her friends brought in with them. They were loud—debating cheeses, movies, whether marine snow counted as poetic or just gross—and somehow managed to take up every inch of air and attention in the room.
It was the perfect cover. Everyone looking at them meant I got to look at her.
That day I watched Coralie worry over my best friend and laugh with hers. I watched her in my hoodie for the first time—the one she’s sleeping in now, sleeves too long, shoulders swallowed up in it. And I swear to everything I believe in, something cracked loose in my ribs at the sight of her in it. I almost said screw the careful plan. Screw the slow build. Something primal in me just wanted to take her home and keep her there.
Later, when we got back to the house, Theo tossed his keys on the coffee table and gave me a look he almost never wears—a real frown.
“Holden,” he said, dragging a hand over his face. “What thepolite fuckare you doing?”
I froze. My arms were already prickled with goosebumps—mostly from the cold because I told Coralie to keep the hoodie. I didn’t want her to take it off. I wanted it to smell like her. I wanted her to have it.
“What do you mean?” I asked, already defensive.
“Don’t play dumb,” he said. “Bro, I love you, but you’re confusing her.”
I didn’t want to get into it. Not with him, not with myself. So I turned and went upstairs, dropped onto my bed like if I closed my eyes hard enough, it would all go away.
Of course, he followed.
“Nuh uh,” he said, leaning in the doorway, arms crossed. “You don’t get to skip the talk.”
I opened one eye. “Fine. Let’s hear it.”
“She’s fucking great, bro,” he started. “She’s like… Einstein. If Einstein was sexy and twenty-something and a little clumsy and could turn entire lectures into comedy sets.”
I blinked at him. “That’s your analogy?”
“Shut up. You know what I mean. She’s one of the best girls I’ve ever met—and I’ve met a lot of them. And she’s definitely one of the bestyou’veever met.”
“You don’t think I know that?” I snapped, sitting up. “You don’t think that’s what’s been running through my head every hour of every day since this semester started?”
“Then why the hell did you tell her you didn’t want her?” His voice rose. Theo doesn’t yell. That night he did.
I exhaled hard, sinking back into the mattress. “It’s for her own good.”
“That’s such coward shit, Holden,” he said instantly. “You love her, bro. You love her or you wouldn’t have a stack of octopus neurology textbooks by your desk. You wouldn’t spend hours prepping for questions she hasn’t even asked yet.”
I didn’t argue. Couldn’t.
“Maybe,” I said finally. “But sometimes that’s not enough. She deserves more than what I can give.”
Theo shook his head, looking genuinely disappointed. “Shedoesdeserve more. She deserves someone who’s sure of her. Someone who doesn’t make her question what’s real and what’s temporary. If you can’t be that guy, Holden, I might.”
And fuck, I saw red.
I was so fucking pissed at him—for saying that, for eventhinkingit. For threatening to give her the very thing I wanted to offer but couldn’t seem to figure out how. Every second she laughed more easily with him than she did with me flashed through my head like a fucking montage from hell. All the times she leaned into his presence while tensing around mine. It wrecked me.
It was one of those rare, dangerous moments where I actually wanted to punch my best friend.
And judging by the way his jaw ticked and his hands balled into fists, he probably wanted to punch me too.
We argued more after that—useless, testosterone-heavy bullshit. Voices raised, pride bruised, nothing new under the sun. But the apology came in the morning, and the damage stuck. He didn’t mean it, he said. But intentions aside, the words cut anyway.
Because Theo was right. Coralie doesn’t need perfect. She doesn’t need easy. She just needshonest. And maybe, if I ever figure out how to be that for her, I’ll finally deserve the way she looks at me.
