want this idealized romance, and I don’t think that’s real life. I’m pretty sure all relationships get boring after a while.”
It’s in that moment that pity is the overwhelming thing I feel. I feel sorry for this troglodyte because he has no idea that love doesn’t have to sour over time. I don’t need to be whisked away in a horse-drawn carriage, and I fully believe both partners are responsible for making a relationship romantic, if that’s what they want. Not whatever heteronormative bullshit that tells us guys are supposed to make the first move and pay for dinner and get down on one knee.
But I do want something big and wild, something that fills my heart completely. I want a fraction of what Emma and Charlie or Lindley and Josef or Trisha and Rose have, even though they’re fictional. I’m convinced that when you’re with the right person, every date, every day feels that way.
“I’m gonna go,” he says, getting up and turning away from the table.
“Spencer?”
He glances back at me, and with a sweet smile, I dive forward to yank off his armband.
1:33 p.m.
I’M STILL BUZZING with Howl adrenaline by the time I hop a bus heading down Third Avenue. It wasn’t until Spencer grumbled about being out of the game so early and surrendered his target (Madison Winters, who wrote a lot of stories about shape-shifting foxes in my creative writing class—one or two, fine, but seven?) that it hit me, zipping through my veins like some wild drug. If it feels this good to kill Spencer, I can only imagine how it’ll feel to beat McNair.
After Spencer left, I sent the juniors a photo of my coffee cup, was rewarded with a green check-mark emoji almost instantaneously, and then scrutinized the list of clues. The ones referring to specific landmarks stood out right away—the big guy at the center of the universe has to be the Fremont Troll, a statue under the Aurora Bridge in a neighborhood nicknamed the “Center of the Universe.”
It makes the most sense to get what I can downtown before going north. Pike Place Market is only a few bus stops away, not worth giving up my parking spot. It’s probably one of the top three things people associate with Seattle, with the Space Needle being number one and Amazon-Microsoft-Boeing-Starbucks being a combined number two. It’s one of the country’s oldest year-round farmers markets, but it’s also a living, breathing piece of Seattle history. And it’s always packed with tourists, even on rainy days.
“Rowan!” a voice calls after I swipe my ORCA card. Savannah Bell waves at me from the middle of the bus, and at first I hesitate, worried she has my name. But she holds up her hands to indicate she doesn’t, and I wave back to confirm the same while groaning inwardly. Bus law dictates that if you run into someone you know on public transit, you are obligated to sit by them.
“Hey, Savannah,” I say as I slide into the seat across from her.
She pushes her black hair behind one ear, revealing chandelier earrings made entirely from recycled materials. Last year she opened an Etsy shop to sell them. I don’t have strong feelings about Savannah Bell, though I know I’m not her favorite person. In every class ranking, she comes in at number three, right behind McNair and me. Though she joked about it sometimes—“Guess I’ll never catch up to you guys!”—I could sense there was some hostility there.
I attempt some small talk. “Good last day?”
“Not bad.” When she laughs, it sounds forced. “I never really stood a chance against you and Neil, did I?”
“It’s possible we were a little intense.”
Savannah reaches into her pocket and flashes a familiar slip of paper. Her Howl target. “I can be content with some revenge.”
Neil McNair, it says.
My stomach drops, which might be the bus’s sudden lurch forward. We’ve only been playing an hour, and the look in Savannah’s eyes is raw determination. Maybe it was arrogant to assume Howl would end with McNair and me, but it’s not enough to simply survive longer than he does. I want to be the one ripping off his bandanna.
If Savannah kills him, I won’t see him until Sunday, his fiery hair sticking out from beneath a graduation cap.
“Good luck,” I offer, though my voice sounds scratchy.
Savannah looks down at her phone, the universal sign for it being okay for you to look down at your own phone, so I do the same.