Aidy and Harrison had hurt each other by linking up in every choice, good or bad, and saying through words or touch or actions, I’m here. We face this together. I knew this, but I wanted to take Nick with me. To keep holding his hand as the room filled up with the rest of what I would soon release. I wanted to ride the wave of it out onto Albany and away from our town. I’d warned myself not to pull him too close, but everything else I prepared got warped, so how was I to really know I shouldn’t if I didn’t at least try? My warnings never took proper account of my feelings.

Oh, feelings.

I squeezed back. Twice for get out of here.

Nick reacted in an instant. “Let me talk to her outside,” he told the room. We stood together, pillars crashing into the cotton sky of bedsheets, dragging along the top until we broke free.

“Hold on.” Aidy grabbed my other hand.

“I’ll be back,” I said to her.

Nick and I crept down the rickety stairs. The back of his hairline looked like a tiny tornado. The caramel brown swooped down and kissed his bare neck, a collision of chaos and calm. Nick’s free hand patted the little swirl, warm from the pressure of my stare.

He pushed open the back door, and we stepped down into the yard. It was built from all the other fences connecting. We walked to the corner where Miss Sherry’s chain-links met the strong metal stakes of someone else’s backyard. I linked my fingers through the chain holes. Nick held a stake. We burrowed until our corners also connected, my shoulder and side pressed into his.

“Ollie,” he said before anything else could be said, but that’s not what he meant.

“Nick,” I said right back. Our names were proclamations of something more.

“What’s happening?” he asked, about me. And us. And Marley.

Me and us and Marley.

I said his name again, because I was still performing. I’d become the type to keep going long after the curtain came down. But the whole paper cup of mystery drink swishing around in me put a brand-new spin on my role. Even the order of my reveals was off, because I told him, “I did this,” which under normal circumstances would’ve been the last thing I got direct about. “The stuff in her room. The letters.”

“Olivia,” he said back. First time he’d ever used my full name. He even said it with a wispy touch, making it sound like a promise and a regret. “That’s why I don’t have a letter,” he realized. “I wasn’t supposed to be a part of this. Was I?”

Yes. He was good.

But this was where it got complicated.

It was so complicated.