Romy shoved her toiletries away. “Not again.”

“Look,” he said, standing. “I was out of line. . . . Ro. This is really hard for me.”

She turned to give him a piece of her mind. Hard for him? How about hard for her to be comfortable around him anymore? Why did he have to go and ruin everything?

But her anger deflated when she saw the hurt in his blue eyes.

“I don’t want you to feel strange around me. Like you can’t talk to me, or be yourself,” he whispered.

She returned his honesty. “And I don’t know how not to feel strange about it.”

He pondered it, thrumming his fingers on the table. “We could . . . go back to just being friends?”

The tightness in her chest lightened. “Could you do that?”

The skin around his eyes was red. He probably hadn’t slept at all, and her heart broke for him. Why did this have to happen to someone so important to her?

“I can try.” He exhaled heavily.

Puberty was hell. Reproduction just wasn’t worth it.

She blew out a long breath. “All right.”

Romy held out her hand.

He chuckled and grabbed it, pulling her into his arms. “Since when have we ever shaken hands?”

“Since never.”

“Friends?”

“Friends,” she echoed, untangling herself. “Catch you at lunch?”

She pulled the door closed behind her, heart sinking at the soft “Always” from the other side.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

“Did you see Tina yesterday?” Thrym was grinning over the table at Nancy. “An absolute mess.”

Nancy snorted into her watercress soup.

Thrym tore a chunk from his roll. “Houston told her the medi-comp was broken so she couldn’t get rid of her hangover.”

Phobos chuckled. “That’s evil. Especially after he used it on himself.”

“I like that man,” Deimos agreed. Deimos had been discharged that morning. Romy didn’t want to think about what this meant for Knot 27.

Freya was drooling over the “twins”. She seemed to change her mind as to her favourite on a daily basis. It no longer bothered Romy. Freya was just a young girl, looking for attention from the coolest males in camp. Not that the green-eyed bandits needed a boost to their confidence.

“What’s your job now that you’re out?” Elara asked Deimos.

Deimos nodded towards Romy. “I’m helping Ro in storage. Houston said it will be relaxed enough to not wear me out. And apparently you could use the help.” He directed the last sentence towards her.

This was news to her. And it confirmed her suspicions that Atlas was avoiding her. He hadn’t made any effort to speak to her since the night in his bungalow. She’d glimpsed him numerous times at a distance, and he hadn’t acknowledged her existence once.