Page 74 of All the way home

. . . what happened

i don’t know man

i . . . might have fucked it up

uh oh

what did u do

ok here’s the situation

and i’m only telling you this once

i didn’t know he went to uofc (thought MRU) and then when he told me he didn’t i freaked out because i thought i wouldn’t have to deal with him again if it all went wrong

except i sort of said some of that outside of my head

hey no offense but what the FUCK

i know

you’re a fucking basket case dude

and now I don’t know what to do

talk to him??? fix it??

should i?

was he fun to be around

like were you having a good time

yes

then jesus zach

go talk to him with words

what the fuck

you can’t just walk away

he is straight up too hot for that

Of course Mara can put it in extremely simple if somewhat crude terms.

Standing there against the wall, Zach closes his eyes and takes a series of deep breaths.

I can do this. He can still fix this—he doesn’t want Kieran to think he doesn’t ever want to see him again, because so far he does.

He really, really does.

Chapter Twenty-Four

Rena

In the cavernous quiet after Zach leaves, Rena can hardly breathe.