“Maybe—except we’re not.”
“You’renotfucking?” She says this like it’s blasphemy.
I wince again, but if she notices, she doesn’t say anything.
“We’re taking things slow.”
“Well. Okay. That’s weird, but okay. What I said still stands, especially now that you’re back in an eighteen-year-old body. All the time and wisdom and perspective in the world wouldn’t be a match for teenage hormones and an underdeveloped prefrontal cortex.”
“If we’re still subject to the same biological pitfalls and weaknesses we always were at this age, does it matter that I know better if I can’t get myself toactbetter? If that’s true, how can any of us be expected to actually fix anything?”
Kimiko shrugs.
“Who’s to say any of us do? Except whoever erased Tinder. They did good.”
I’m overwhelmed; everything we’ve discussed is roaring around in my head, and none of it makes any sense. As I struggle to process the implications of what she’s said, I realize—
“I still have no clue what to do about Madison.”
“You might have to wait and see how it plays out.”
“Wait?I can’t just sit back and be a passive character in my own second life,” I cry rather dramatically.
Damn. I reallydohave an eighteen-year-old brain.
“You don’t have to be passive… just be careful,” she tells me. “Try to machinate too much, and you might drive everyone away. Take some time and consider if you reallywantthese people in your life. You grew apart from Madison in your previous life. Is it the end of the world if it happens a little sooner this time? Not just with Madison—with everyone.Whodo you want in this new life you’re building? It’s up to you, and you don’t owe it to anyone to keep them around if they’re not additive. Just because they were there before doesn’t mean they need to be there this time. It’s hard to write a new story when it’s populated by all the same characters.”
I leave soon after, Kimiko’s words swirling through my mind.
20
By the time I get back to campus, I’m tired, a weary exhaustion that I feel all the way down to my bones, but I still text Alex to see if he’s awake. Kimiko’s words are in my head, and I can’t stop thinking about the question she asked.
Whodo I want in my life?
And why is it that the first person who came to mind when she posed that question was Alex? Iknowwho he becomes, I know it’s a person I don’t like, and I know it’s very possible that heartbreak lies at the end of the road I’m on.
I’m not sure I care.
Does that just come down to teenage hormones? Or is it more?
The Alex I’ve gotten to know isn’t the Alex I left behind, and it’s not fair to judge him against a version of himself that doesn’t exist yet. So the moment he texts me back that he’s awake, I head to his dorm.
He opens the door, his face poised in a smirk, as if he’s readying himself to give me shit for ditching him all evening. Whatever he sees on my face causes the smirk to slide right off.
“Are you okay? What happened?”
I’ve had hours to pull myself together, and I really thought I had succeeded, but it took only one look for him to see straight through me.
He backs up to allow me into his room and shuts the door. Gently, he places a hand on my shoulder and says, “You don’t have to tell me what happened, just tell me if you’re okay.”
I nod, only once. He breathes a sigh of relief and wraps me in a tight embrace.
I had half an hour on the drive from Kimiko’s place to campus to think about what I would say, but now that I’m in front of him, the words spill out with no eloquence.
“What are we doing?”
It’s not that Alex takes particularly long to respond, but he takes long enough for me to note that there is something careful, almost cautious, to the way he carries himself, something that I think might always have been there if I had taken the time to notice.
