Everything about this is so weird. I’ve been here for hours and we’ve said about a total of twenty words to each other. I’m feeling like a bad friend but also like Adam is being a bit of a bad friend by not telling me what’s going on with him. But I don’t know if that’s what people do. Is sitting in silence and then falling asleep normal friend behavior?

Adam is queueing up something else on his computer, very pointedly not looking at me, and I’m suddenly filled with anger. I know it’s irrational, but I’m ticked off that Adam hasn’t even made an effort to talk to me. If he didn’t want to hang, I gave him an out. He didn’t have to invite me in just to ignore me.

“What the hell is going on with you?” I ask before I can stop myself. Shit. This is why Dr. Bright keeps telling you to check in with your own emotions, Caleb. So that when they come rushing back, you don’t say stupid-ass things.

“What do you mean?” Buzzing starts under my skin as Adam looks at me out of the corner of his eye. I’ve made him nervous. Good. Maybe he’ll actually start talking to me then.

“You’ve been weird all night,” I argue.

“Well, sorry for not keeping you entertained,” he drones, but I feel the swirl of anxiety and self-disappointment as he says it. Shit, now I feel bad.

“No,” I say, backpedaling, “I didn’t mean—I’m just worried, I guess.”

“Worried?” he scoffs. “What the hell does that mean?”

“It means that I can fee—” I bite the words back, changing the shape of them in my mouth before I speak again. “I can see that you’re drowning and I don’t know what to do about it.”

Adam looks like he’s been slapped. Feels like it too. There’s the caffeine jolt of fear, a toxic addition to the sludge sundae we already have going on. I want to take it back, want to apologize, but my own frustration is still strong enough to be drowning everything else out.

“If you don’t want to be here, Caleb, you can just leave.” He fails to meet my eyes and the fear evens into a steady stream.

“That’s not—” I’m getting even more frustrated now. “I don’t want to leave, I just want you to talk to me. I’m just—I’m here.”

Adam’s jaw clenches as his eyes wander the room, looking at anything but me. I want to grab his face, steer it toward mine, rattle it and not let go until the truth starts falling out of his head.

God, if this is how Dr. Bright feels when getting me to talk, I owe her, like, a thousand apologies.