“Lucky for me, I didn’t have to borrow yours. They would have been high waters on me.”

“Maybe you could bring them back in style.” At the look on my face, she added, “I’m just saying, if anyone can do it, it’s you.”

“I’ll leave that to Audrey Hepburn.”

“I can’t believe you’re going to work in the dirt. What are you going to do about your manicure?”

“I have an appointment tomorrow during lunch, thank you very much.”

She smiled at me, proud and a little smug. “I’m proud of you.”

“For what?”

“I don’t know. Loosening up. I don’t think I’ve ever seen you this relaxed, not even when we were teenagers. You were too busy planning all the ways to crush someone in debate or working on your student council calendar to actually have fun or relax.”

“Hey, prepping for debate is fun.”

“Says you. But arguing is your love language, so I shouldn’t be surprised.”

I snorted a laugh and rolled my eyes. “Kash promised to teach me how to grow something.”

“You? I’ve seen your cactus graveyard. Kash doesn’t know what he’s gotten himself into.”

“He really doesn’t,” I said on a laugh as something in my chest twisted.

A pause while she watched me. “You like him.”

An answering sigh from deep in my lungs. “I really do.”

She turned, folding her arms on the back of the couch with her brows drawn. “What are you going to do about it?”

“Nothing.”

“Nothing?”

“Nothing. Not yet. I don’t have to decide,” I said for the thousandth time that week.

Carefully, she said, “No, you don’t. But at some point, you will.”

“I know,” I answered to my fingernails, not wanting to meet her eyes.

“It’s been weeks. I don’t mean to rain on your parade—”

“But you’re going to.”

“—but I’m going to,” she confirmed. “Things can be uncomplicated, but not forever. And not unless you’re booty calling and don’t actually like the other person. Which isn’t the case.”

“I know.”

“And now you’re going to the greenhouse on what can only be considered a date—”

“It’s not a date,” I insisted.

She gave me a look.

“What? We’re mucking around in the dirt, for God’s sake.”

Her look exaggerated. “It’s a date, and dates are supposedly verboten. Just like spending the night, which was also forbidden, and which you have also disregarded.”

“You sound awfully judgy,” I snarked.

“I’m not judging, I’m trying to get you to admit the truth. You like him, Lila, and there’s nothing wrong with that. You’re allowed to have feelings for him.”

Shock hit me first, the simple and naked truth of it blinding. For a moment, I was stunned, not realizing something very important.