is at its darkest, that’s when the magic appears.
It’s not magic that enters my room when the stillness of the night creates a silence around us. It’s Peter. My eyes squint at the stream of light filtering in from the hallway, and Peter notices because he walks in and switches on my lamp. He settles on the edge of my bed again, his hand on my leg. “Your mom’s asleep, the crisis workers are going to take shifts overnight, and they’ll be here all of tomorrow.”
“Okay,” I whisper, not looking at him.
“Have you reapplied your cream?”
I force my body to half sit up. “No, I forgot.”
“Well, we better do that. We don’t want that flawless skin of yours scarring.” He grabs the cream the paramedics left for me and gets more comfortable on the bed. Then he reaches up, pulls the covers down until they’re resting at my waist. He removes the dressing, slowly, carefully, and starts applying the cream where needed. Starting at my neck, he moves to my shoulders, taking his time, and then lower, lower, to my chest revealed by the tank top I’ve been wearing all day. He spends the most time there, just above my breasts. His touch is soft, heated, nurturing.
I can take care of you, Ava. But it’s our little secret.
“Your mom’s getting worse, Ava,” he murmurs.
“Stop it.”
“I know you don’t want to hear this, but she needs help.”
“I just need to get through this year. For Trevor. And then… then…”
He sighs. “Then what?”
I don’t know. My shoulders fall with the first sob that consumes me. I keep my cries quiet, but he’s there to hold me. To wipe the tears from my eyes. To assure me that everything will be okay, even when he doesn’t believe it himself.
He finishes tending to my physical wounds, then gets under the covers with me. “Come here,” he whispers, helping me to lie back down. I rest my head on his chest while his fingers stroke my arm. His chest rises and falls with his steady breaths, his heartbeat forming a steady rhythm blasting in my eardrums.
Thump, thump.
Thump, thump.
I close my eyes and listen; try to find what I’m looking for.
But it’s not there.
Because he’s not The One.
The Holder of Hope.
The Creator of Magic.
He’s not Connor.
Chapter 30
Connor
Monday morning, Ava sent me a message telling me she wasn’t going to be at school, that something came up with her mom. I offered to help however I could, but she didn’t reply to my messages.
Tuesday morning, same damn thing.
Finally, on Wednesday, she tells me she’s going, but she doesn’t need a ride. Peter will take her. Whatever. At least she’s going, and I’ll get to see her. Five days of no-Ava is too damn long. But when psych class begins and she’s not sitting next to me, I start to worry, and that worry starts burning a hole in my gut. Something’s… off. And I don’t know what to do about it. Finally, about twenty minutes into class, the door opens and she appears. That first breath I inhale when I see her, God, it’s like I’d been holding on to it for all five days. She hands Mr. McCallister a note and then makes her way over to me, a slight smile on her lips that has me goddamn giddy with excitement. I’ve missed her. In all the possible ways you can miss someone, I’ve craved her.
Just her presence alone seems to settle my anxiety, and I haven’t even spoken to her yet. She sits down next to me, her leg tapping mine beneath the table.
I pull out a notepad as inconspicuously as possible and scribble down: You’re a sight for sore eyes, Ava.
With a smile, she reads what I wrote and writes back: It’s good to see you, too, I suppose. Then crosses it out completely and writes: I’ve missed you.
My heart does a stupid flip, and I settle my hand on her knee, praying she won’t push me away. As soon as the teacher’s turned his back to the class, I face her.
My eyes thirst for her, as lame as that sounds. But it’s true. Five fucking days and I’d forgotten how hot she was. I’m staring, breathing her in, and I don’t even care. I’ve missed her hair, a mess of a thing that seems to have a life of its own. And her eyes surrounded by thick, long lashes. She has freckles on her cheeks, right below her eyes, but just a few.