“Sorry,” I apologize to a family of pirates. They try to squeeze around me. I’m in the way. I apologize to two preteen girls dressed as angels. I knocked into one of their wings—or maybe I just barely brushed it? She didn’t seem that upset. I don’t even know if she noticed.
Willow Moore isn’t a total failure at life.
I have something going for me.
I could go talk to Lily or Lo, but they look like they’re having a sweet moment on their haybale, both squeezed close together, and their tiny son, dressed like a Gryffindor-to-be, is with them.
Likewise, Rose and Connor have their daughter in arm, and they stand so near one another, their lips moving too fast to keep up. Not that I’d approach them together. I think I could grow the courage to approach Rose without Connor.
I push up my glasses and mutter, “Carpe Diem.” I’m not a boy like any of the students at Welton Academy in Dead Poets Society, but I can Carpe Diem just like them.
I just need to…figure out where to go. I spin around, standing so close to the pool’s edge that I back up and back up. Just what I need, to fall right in the—
I whack a torch.
Oh God.
I whacked a flaming torch staked into the grass. I go to grab the iron pole, and I fall with it onto a haybale. Where that awful neighborhood lady, Mrs. Nash, and her son sit. They spring from the hazardous area I just created, and I clumsily collapse onto the hay that begins to singe and burn and flame.
“Willow!” Lo yells.
I cough at the gust of smoke and try to stand, my cheek hot. I smack a flame off my skirt and just fall to the grass. So I can crawl away from the fire.
On my knees and hands, I quickly scuttle beyond the haybale that blazes.
Parents are already scooping water from the pool using plastic buckets and Solo cups. While they douse the flame, I stare wide-eyed, frozen in shock.
What just happened?
“Willow?” Lo squats beside me, his amber-colored eyes pinpointed with worry. He scans me to see if I’m singed. I think my confidence burned the most.
“I’m…” sorry. I blink a couple times, trying to push past this cold shock. As my horror meets his concern, I only hope that this flaming haybale isn’t a metaphor for what I’ve brought Loren Hale. “I’m sorry,” I whisper.
“She’s in shock.” I hear the icy voice of Rose Calloway. Dressed like Natalie Portman from Black Swan, she towers high above me. I notice Ryke and Daisy helping extinguish the fire while Lily and Connor hold their kids by the food table, distracting them from the mayhem.
I’m sorry.
I must mutter it again because Lo says, “I’ve done a hell of a lot worse.”
I space out enough that he grows more worried. Suddenly, he scoops me in his arms.
Oh God.
Loren Hale is carrying me towards his house.
I’m being carried for the first time, and it’s by my famous brother. My shock just quadrupled. Maggie, my only friend from Maine, would die in his arms.
As Loren Hale climbs the porch, Garrison is sprinting over from—well I can’t really tell where he came from. Too many people are shifting around the backyard.
“Hey, what happened?” Garrison follows Lo as he brings me inside.
I don’t hear Lo’s response over the noise, but I can fill it in just fine: Willow knocked over the torch and then almost lit herself on fire.
Lo sets me on the kitchen counter, the house much quieter, and I hang my head, staring at my hands. I hear the faucet, and out of the corner of my eye, I see Rose wetting a washcloth.
“I’m fine,” I mutter, but for some reason tears try to well, and I keep pushing my glasses up that slip down my nose. Only Rose, Garrison, and Loren are in the kitchen right now, but I don’t release these kinds of emotions in front of people often. Even just three people seems like a lot.
Rose passes me the washcloth. “Here. This’ll help.”
I dab the coldness to my cheek and forehead.
Lo checks his phone. “Lily said it’s not on fire anymore. See, it’s not a problem.”
I rub beneath my eye just as a tear threatens to fall. “I didn’t mean to come into your life and set things on fire.”
Lo can’t help but laugh. “You think this is bad? Christ, Willow—I’ve set more metaphorical things on fire than this guy.” He points at Garrison.
Garrison raises his brows in surprise. “Really?”
“Yeah, really.” Lo, with his sharp as ice cheekbones and narrowed amber eyes, seems more frightening than the fire itself.
“It’s true,” Rose validates. “He’s horrendous.”
Lo flashes her a dry smile. “Says the girl dressed like a possessed ballerina.”
“Black Swan is a real thing.”
“Sure.” Lo’s gaze drifts back to me. “So what I’m saying is, you didn’t ruin anything by being here, except a goddamn haybale that no one is going to miss. I’m just glad you didn’t catch on fire. Because you—I would’ve missed.”