“Oh my,” I said. “Let’s discuss this turn of events, then, shall we?”

She whipped her hair up into a ponytail. “He’s coming over here—oh no—tell me when he’s here; I can’t look.” She pulled a book from her backpack and pretended to read, and I watched Elliot smile, walk toward our table—and then Katiana were there beside him, talking and laughing, holding his arms, looking right at me. Daring me to do something. Daring me to stop them.

“Need some help in the pottery studio!” Tiana said. They steered Elliot away and out of the cafeteria. Elliot looked back over his shoulder.

And I just sat there.

“Is he coming?” Kira whispered into her book.

“Uh…no,” I said. “Some guys came over and got him for something. They’re gone.”

She looked up. “Oh,” she said, sad. “Just as well. I look crappy today.”

“You look beautiful, as always, and you know it.”

Now she rolled her eyes.

“If you were in art class,” I said, “you’d see him almost every day.”

She put her book back in her backpack. “Yeah, yeah. We are failing with our potential romantic entanglement interactions today,” she sighed.

“One thing I’ll say for psychology,” I said, “it’s making your vocabulary jam-packed with lots of syllables.”

“Indeed.” She nodded. “They take the place of an active dating life in a surprisingly satisfying way.”

—

Salishwood on Saturday morning after the date night was an exercise in self-control. Even before Sean got there, because of course fucking Natan was there, right where I’d been assigned to pull out some blackberry roots, strumming and tuning his stupid guitar, and he started in on “Ring of Fire,” which made me wish I could personally apologize to June Carter Cash. Everything we’d heard through the window, all we knew about Natan’s life and Jane’s, the nepotism that kept him ruining every otherwise-perfect day spent in the trees, made me even less inclined to make eye contact with him.

“You like this song?” he said, humming flat and sharp and just—wrong.

I pretended not to hear.

“You know, the title of this tune is one we naturalists think of in a completely different way than Johnny intended. You see—”

“Hi, guys.” Sean’s beautiful, beautiful voice saved me.

“Good morning, sir,” Natan sang. Gah.

Sean smiled at me but did not hug me, as per the promise he’d made. Which, when he walked toward us, so lean and strong and perfect, I regretted asking for. He was right there, and I already missed him. He caught my eye, tipped his head toward Natan, and made a Well, this is awkward face. I nodded.

Sunk-cost fallacy.

Maybe Kira was right. My head pounded.