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In that perfect moment, indicative of all the time ahead of them, Molly decided to put the time behind them to bed.

“Aster,” she said. He made another throaty noise against her ear, rocketing sparks through her veins. “It’s time to give up.”

He didn’t react at first, still spoiling her with soft nips and nuzzles. Then he slowed, pulling away from her ear.

“Give what up?” he asked. The serenity on his face vanished.

“Research. Looking for answers. Hoping that my memory is going to come back or worrying something worse might happen. It’s time to give up and move on. I want to live my life. With you.”

It was a clinical, simple truth. They had so much more they could look forward to. She didn’t need her actual memories, not anymore, in order to build something new with him.

He was still, quiet, and he didn’t look at her until finally he said, “No.”

Molly blinked. “What—what do you mean, ‘no?’”

“I mean no,” he repeated, his words solidifying in a new way, armed with conviction.

“You said you wouldn’t give up until I told you to. It’s time, Aster. I’m telling you to.”

“I—” He faltered. And then, as if he’d only realized it himself, he finished his thought. “I guess—I lied.”

He rolled away from her, staring at the ceiling, as Molly tried to sort through what had just happened.

“You said it was my mind, my decision.” Her voice was so quiet she could barely hear it herself.

“I know I did,” he replied, volume equally absent. “But I can’t.”

“Can’t or won’t?”

“Does the difference matter?”

The heat inside her flared, no longer a comfortable kind of warmth, but something aching and closer to anger. She didn’t want that. She didn’t want to ruin the precious thing they’d just shared. But if he didn’t know the difference, she needed him to learn.

“One is a matter of your skill. The other, of your will.”

And one was certainly worse than the other.

He didn’t say anything, and Molly imagined she could hear the thoughts churning inside his head.

“Aster?” she asked into the heavy air around them. She had her own eyes fixed on the ceiling as she tried not to cry on the heels of what had been such a spectacular thing. Despite this new wedge between them, Molly forced herself to be brave. Worse things had failed to break her. This would not define their evening.

“Tell me about our wedding,” she said.

He released a breath and turned toward her again, wrapping an arm around her waist.

With lips pressed to her skin, he did.

Before

Molly stared down at the test papers in front of her, stomach churning at the grade in the upper right-hand corner. Eighty-three percent. Officially the worst grade she’d gotten in her entire life, which included that one particularly awful semester in Latin where she’d turned out an A by the skin of her teeth.

She swallowed against what felt suspiciously like stomach bile gurgling up the back of her throat. She absolutely could not fumble a single one of her grades with an impending plagiarism investigation looming over her. It would look like guilt to suddenly lose her edge. And she was not guilty. Anyone with half a brain knew she cited all her sources; further evidence that Aster Bishop was in possession of less than half a brain. His accusation was completely baseless.

Across the room, she watched Bishop fan himself with his test papers before high-fiving his friend in the seat beside him. He glanced across the room, eyes locking with hers. Her expression must have betrayed her utter devastation, because he smiled and held up his index finger to form a one, then made a zero, then another zero, followed by a concluding middle finger for emphasis.

Molly had to look away, back down at her own test papers. There was no way. Literally no way. This organic chemistry test had been downright impossible. She’d known going into this class that organic chem was less about rote memorization and more about applying theoretical principles, but she’d memorized a staggering number of facts and formulas regardless. And they hadn’t helped her in the least.

“He cheated,” were the first words out of her mouth upon intercepting Roy between periods.