Page 23

All weekend, I don’t leave the room except to shower. By Monday, I decide that I’m not changing a thing. Not my routes. Not my times. Not my seat in the dining hall. It’s already safe, so it should stay safe. I curated my existence here to stay far away from him.

So on Monday, I take my usual way to micro. Same path across the quad. Same side door into the business building. Same hallway at ten-fifty, so crowded you have to turn sideways.

And I stop dead.

My heart is crawling up my throat.

Rafe is right there.

He’s against the wall by the door to the back stairwell, his hands in his jacket pockets, looking at his phone. Rafferty Waleska is never in the business building. I know this as a fact. He has no class here, no friends here, no reason. He’s just there, in the middle of my Monday, like he knew this is where I’d be.

I keep my eyes down. I fold myself into a group of girls and let them carry me along, and I don’t look at him. He doesn’t look at me. Not once. I’m almost grateful. I’m almost past.

“Tessa!”

Elliot. Curly hair, rowing jacket, his whole arm up over the crowd. My name rings off the walls of that hallway, bright and loud and happy, and every inch of my body goes tight.

I’m already past Rafe. I don’t look back.

Shit.

“Happy Monday, Elliot,” I mutter.

He smiles down at me, and then his eyes go over my shoulder and stay there a second too long. I step around him and keep walking, because I already know what he’s looking at.

Elliot catches up. “Are you okay?”

I force a smile. “Yeah. I’m fine. You?”

He looks behind us. “Yeah.”

“Tess.”

Rafe’s voice stops me cold.

It’s like ice through my veins. I was not prepared for this.

His voice isn’t loud, but it cuts through the whole hallway. The back of my neck goes hot, and for one second, I’m fourteen and standing next to my lunch.

“You sure?” Elliot asks.

I nod, forcing a soft smile. “Yeah. I’ll meet you in class. Save me a seat.”

I look back down the hallway. Rafe is staring at me. I suck in a breath and blink.

“Thanks, Elliot.”

Elliot goes. Rafe keeps his eyes on mine, and then he tilts his chin toward the door. I know it. I’ve known it since ninth grade. He starts to walk, and I follow. He pushes the door to the back stairwell open with his shoulder and goes through it, and the door starts to swing shut on its hinge behind him.

I catch the door before it closes.

The stairwell is concrete and cold, gray paint on the walls and a metal railing worn shiny where people’s hands go. There’s a window on the landing that doesn’t close all the way, and the wind comes through the gap with a thin, high sound.

It’s empty like he knew it would be.

The door clicks shut behind me.

And my body goes back. Wet canvas against my toes. My bag crushed flat against my chest. Mint gum and cologne in the wind.