Page 108 of All the way home

But that’s not what happens.

“How were you not freaking out about losing all this?” Kieran picks up the scarf, running his fingers over the soft green pattern. “This stuff is priceless.”

It looks like he’s being serious too. “Oh, I was! I’m just always freaking out about everything all the time, so it didn’t have to disrupt the status quo.”

“How are you not, like, disintegrating?” Kieran asks with a grin.

“Invisible entropy,” Zach tells him with a shrug, placing the lantern back in its spot. Then he sighs, shoulders collapsing. “They really had to unwrap everything, didn’t they?”

“We’re going to fix that.”

Zach blinks up at him. “What?”

“Right now.” With a groan and a hand on his knee, Kieran stands. “Come on. They have gift wrap back by those mugs, I remember.”

“I’m not buying airport gift wrap,” Zach scoffs, but Kieran holds up a hand.

“I didn’t say you’re buying it.”

“You aren’t buying me airport gift wrap either.”

“What are you gonna do?” Tilting his head, Kieran smiles down at him. “Stop me?”

“I could walk away at any point,” Zach reminds him, and Kieran laughs.

“Okay, do it then.”

With a scowl that morphs into a smile halfway through, Zach zips his suitcase shut.

Chapter Thirty-Five

Rena

At her elbow, Lucas murmurs, “What’s wrong?”

“I need a minute,” Rena says, strangled.

“Are you okay?”

“I’m just going to take a walk.”

“Do you want company?”

“No,” Rena says sharply. Maybe too sharply.

Lucas’s expression flattens out.

“What is going on with you tonight?” Lucas asks, muffled as if through a heavy stage curtain.

It almost all comes out right there. She almost spills every single thing she’s thinking out into the space between them. Part of her wants to let it splatter onto the tile and see what sort of shape it would make.

But she can’t.

She can’t.

“I’m just tired,” she whispers. “I’m sorry. I’m so tired.”

And somehow—somehow—that’s satisfactory enough for him. He nods.