It was a little after one a.m. when Jason Voorhees finally met his way overdue end in the sewers under Manhattan. Lilah and Vega passed out halfway into the ridiculous slasher flick. Amanda envied them. Corie and Jesse had jokes for days, but the weight of the week and the long drive had finally caught up with her somewhere around the hour mark where Jason was terrorizing teens on a boat miles away from New York City. All she wanted was to hop a train to Snoozeville. The warm and restless energy emanating from Sam’s end of the couch was the only thing keeping her awake. She could sense his every breath, every small shift of his body. Focusing on Jason’s rampage was the only thing keeping her from thinking of how differently the night would have gone if she hadn’t cut him off so unceremoniously.

Jesse hit stop as the credits rolled and the familiar groans and stretches started around the room. Amanda looked away as Corie leaned over and kissed Vega awake.

Sam eased to the edge of the couch, toying with his cowboy hat perched on his knee before he turned to her. “Ready to head back?” Amanda almost twitched at the raw edge to his voice. Sleepy looked good on him.

“Yeah sure.” She stood and shrugged on her coat. “Thanks for having me over,” she whispered to Jesse.

“Anytime. Corie, take Lilah with you. She’s gonna wake up at four a.m. all confused.”

“Copy that. Babe, come on,” she said, helping a sleepwalking Vega off the love seat. They all made their way back to the foyer and said their goodnights as they found their shoes. The girls headed in the direction of one of the other houses as Amanda followed Sam back to his Tesla. They were quiet on the way back to the ranch. Amanda attributed it to the quiet beauty of the night. The sky was so clear and the stars so bright she didn’t want to interrupt them. Sam didn’t seem to mind. He didn’t say a word until they pulled to a stop in front of the lodge’s front doors. No bellhops at this hour.

Amanda’s pulse quickened when Sam turned to her, a gentle, kind smile touching his lips. “I’ll walk you in.”

“Okay,” she managed to squeak out. It was quiet between them again as they made their way through the lobby and the winding hallways back to her room. She dug out her keycard when they finally reached the door, then dug a little deeper for the nerve she needed to say the words that were on the tip of her tongue.

“Hey, Sam?”

“Hey, Amanda.”

“Uh, hypothetically, how do you feel about second chances?”

“Well, I would need a hypothetical scenario. What kind of second chances are we hypothetically talking about?”