CHAPTER33
NOVA
“Areyou sure you don’t want to stay?” I ask Zeke, who pulls his wool hat down over his ears.
His stare is blank, and I tiptoe around his mood, still baffled by him walking out of the shower on me a few days ago. I feel like I’m standing on the edge of something, teetering into something unknown.
“There’s a bonfire party out in the meadows,” he says, looking at me for only a moment. I have no idea what the meadows are, and it’s a reminder of the space between us. The things we don’t understand about each other. “I don’t feel like sitting around.”
He’s been straight-up avoiding me, and I get why he doesn’t want to play games on New Year’s with all the girls in his family, but it’s a lot more involved than that. He pulls on his winter coat, and I grab him by the arm. I don’t have a chance to think about it until after, and he’s quizzing me with his stare.
“Happy New Year,” I say quietly and then spin away before tears pool in my eyes. I know he’s going through something, but I want him back. The him from Christmas. From before the shower, when in a flash, I saw everything in him, and then nothing at all. It frightened me. It still frightens me.
There’s complete silence from the hall. No movement, no sound. Only the winds of change whistling through my gut. I want to go back to the entrance and say all that, but instead, I sink into the couch. Figgy crawls on my lap and stares up at me with questioning eyes. My cat even thinks I’m a coward.
After the longest time, the door finally opens, and his bootsteps echo on the stairs. He stops in front of the house, and through the window, I see him. He turns in two complete circles like he keeps wanting to come back but changes his mind.
Then he’s gone.
Tears burn down my cheeks, and I wipe them aggressively. I’m not going to spend my night sad about a guy. This is my last chance to hang out with Tabby before she goes. I’ve never had a quiet, girls-only New Year’s.
I pull in a long, deep breath and gather everything back behind my barriers. By the time Tabby, Del, and Pris get here, I’ve packed it all away, and I’m ready to be what I need to be. To look how I need to look so they don’t become suspicious of this wringing pain in my chest.
The evening is spent drinking fizzy water and playing games and laughing, all while my heart slowly crumbles to dust.