Three years later, it’s still surreal.

Loren Hale changed everything.

For me and Garrison.

2 PRESENT DAY – September

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

GARRISON ABBEY

Age 20

Seven days. Six hours. And three excruciating minutes. But it’s not like I’m counting how long it’s been since Willow and I put an ocean between us.

I like numbers.

I like to code.

It’s what I fucking do.

Even at two in the morning on a Friday night. My headphones are tossed aside on my mattress. Giving my ears a rest from wearing them in the office all day. Did I mention it was Friday?

Which means the asshole in the apartment next door is currently hosting some sort of first semester bash in his place. The walls thump from his shitty EDM music.

I can code with most music.

That’s not what’s really distracting me. It’s the laughter and the high-pitched squeals and the frat-bro cheering that pulls my mind away from work.

“JARED!” a girl shrieks. Someone knocks into a shared wall and my Silversun Pickups poster falls off the hook and hits the floor.

Yeah, that’s it.

I push away from my keyboard on my rolling chair and slide across the hardwood to my stereo setup. I crank it up. Full blast. And then I scroll through a playlist on my phone.

Fuck their EDM.

I put on my favorite band.

Interpol. The song “Evil” starts out slow and builds up, but it emits from my speaker so fucking loud that it’s like I’m in a competition with my neighbor. Whose eardrums can we blast out first? Truth, I’d be fine getting a permanent migraine from listening to Interpol. It’d be worth it.

Barely a minute later, a knock slams on my door. “Hey!”

The guy says something else, but I can’t make it out. Suddenly, the EDM music cuts off.

“HEY!” he screams, more clearly now. “Turn your shit down, man!” He bangs his fist at my door, and my pulse ratchets up.

She flashes in my head.

If Willow were here, she’d tell me to turn it down. Don’t start a confrontation. Don’t be that guy.

But she’s not here.

I stand up.

The pounding on my door intensifies. “Fuck, can you hear me?!”

Striding over, each second there feels like someone is clenching my heart in their fist. Pump. Pump. Trying to wake the cold, lifeless organ.

The chorus starts as I put my hand on the knob. I’ve listened to this song a million-and-one times, but tonight it sounds different in my head. I should turn it off. But something is wrong with me. I feel it deep inside me like dark ink bleeding into paper, and Willow can’t change me.

No one can.

I open the door.

My neighbor’s angered brown eyes pierce me. Baseball cap turned backward. Penn shirt and khakis. He looks like he should be at the Alpha Omega Zeta house, not some apartment building in Center City.

“Yeah?” I ask, not needing to raise my voice over the music since we’re close enough.