Page 216 of Wild Card 13

“It’ll be more tolerable if you’re there.”

“You’ll survive two hours with your friends.”

“Bold assumption.”

Her thumb had brushed once over my knuckle. “Go have fun, Ty.”

She had meant it. Lucy was not testing me. She was not waiting for me to prove something. She had plans with her mom, and even if the whole situation made something protective and ugly twist beneath my ribs, I knew better than to make her feel guilty for going.

So I kissed her forehead in front of God, Northbend High, and Arlo Thomas’s judgmental face. “I’ll call you later,” I promised.

“You better.”

“I always do.”

Arlo, standing two feet away with his arms crossed, had made a noise like he was storing that sentence for future litigation.

Now, hours later, my room felt too quiet.

Simon: BUZZARD. KELLER’S. NOW.

Then my phone lit with Lucy’s name. “Hi.” Her voice came through softer than usual, a little muffled around the edges.

My body reacted before my brain did. “You okay?”

“Yeah.” A pause. “I just wanted to say have fun tonight.”

I leaned forward, forearms on my knees. “Dinner still happening?”

The silence lasted one beat too long. “It should be,” she said.

I stared at the floor, at the heel mark I had left in the wood when I was twelve and pretending I could hockey stop in socks. “You want me to stay close?”

“No,” she said immediately. Then softer, “No. Go to Mase’s.”

“Luce.”

“I mean it. If things change, I’ll call Naomi or I’ll call you. But you should be with your friends tonight.” She took a breath. “You’re leaving soon.”

“I’m notleavingleaving.”

She went quiet again, and I hated myself a little. Because I was. We both knew it. I could dress it up with phone calls and road trips and Boston-and-Fargo jokes, but the facts were already packed in the corner of my room with my training gear.

“I know,” she said.

I closed my eyes.

Downstairs, Mom laughed at something Kendrick said. The sound carried up through the vents, warm and familiar, and for one wild second I wanted to be eight years old again. No future. No scouts. No plane tickets. No girl on the other end of the phone trying to be brave because I had not figured out how to be scared without making jokes.

“I love you,” I said.

Her breath caught so softly I almost missed it. “I love you too.”

By the time I got to Mase’s lake house, the party had already spilled out onto the deck and down toward the dock. Early summer sat thick over everything, warm and damp and smelling like cut grass, lake water, sunscreen, bug spray, and smoke from the firepit someone had started too early and too aggressively.

Trucks crowded the gravel drive. Music thumped from openwindows. Someone had strung lights between the deck posts, and they glowed soft gold against the deepening blue of the sky.

Simon spotted me before I made it halfway across the yard.