Chapter 16

When I got to Bobby's room, the door was open.

Retreat, my brain said.

Instead, I froze. I might have stayed there forever except Bobby appeared in the doorway a moment later. He'd taken off his running shoes, but otherwise he was still in his athletic apparel. The tips of his ears were red. The tip of his nose, too. A hint of warm body and clean sweat hung in the air, mixing with Hemlock House's familiar scents of furniture polish and books and sea salt.

Bobby tilted his head toward the door as though in explanation and said, "I wanted to talk to you."

"Oh. Okay." And then—in a pure Dashtastrophe of eloquence—"Um, I wanted to talk to you too."

That definitely had an effect. His dark brows knit together. He set his jaw. He said, "I'm angry with you."

(Bobby Mai, ladies and gentlemen. Master of direct, honest, mature communication. So much for all that bunk about not being able to discuss his feelings.)

"You know what?" I said. "I changed my mind."

"Come in here so I can close the door."

"That sounds like there's going to be yelling involved."

"Right now."

I slunk into the room. I imagined if I were ever buried alive, the sound of the coffin lid falling shut would be a lot like his door closing.

In spite of my rising—what's a word for terror, but you're also 99% sure you love someone?—I found myself greedily taking in details. In the months that Bobby had lived here, I could count the times I'd been invited into his room on one hand and not use all my fingers.

It looked like it was uninhabited. It had all of Hemlock House's usual décor: a huge fireplace, a massive oil painting (I want to say a stallion?), a canopy bed, a marble-topped vanity, a wardrobe, and so many candlesticks. He hadn't left any clothes on the floor. (Mama Mai had raised him right.) He didn't have any personal effects on the nightstand. There was no messy pile of books on the floor, no stack of loose papers, no errant Xbox controller that had somehow wandered upstairs. For heaven's sake, I didn't even see a charger for his phone. With something like outrage, I realized he probably rolled it up and put it away in a drawer every morning.

My first thought was hurt—I had invited Bobby to make this his home. I had told him he could stay as long as he wanted. But he'd kept everything he owned in storage, aside from his clothes, and he lived like this was a motel, and every day might be checkout. It made me wonder, yet again, if I'd misread everything. If I was wrong. Not about how I felt—the last few days had done nothing if not clarified my own awareness of my feelings. But what if Bobby didn't feel the same way? What if it had all been in my head?

But that way lay madness. I knew, if I went down that path, I'd lose myself again in the doubts and uncertainties. In the fear. In the need to protect myself. So, I thought about what Fox and Keme had tried to tell me about Bobby. About what I'd intuited all on my own. The stoicism. The control. And behind it all—what? Fear. Maybe I wasn't all that intuitive. After all, Bobby had tried to explain it to me himself, not so long ago.

When I turned around, he stood in front of the door, arms folded.

"I guess I'll go first—" I said.

"I can't believe you did that last night." The words were low and hard and, yes, angry. The color in Bobby's face didn't have anything to do with the cold. "We've talked about this. You knew you could have gotten hurt. You knew you could have gotten killed. I feel like I'm going crazy sometimes. We talk about this stuff, and then you do it anyway. I think I've done a good job of explaining that I don't expect you not to get involved. I know these things matter to you. I know you're good at finding the truth. Those are some of the reasons I—" But whatever he'd been about to say, he didn't say it. Something flashed in his eyes, and his mouth twisted, and he drew a deep breath through his nose. "I also feel like I've done a good job of communicating that I want to make sure you're safe, and I'll do whatever I can to help you."

That wasn't the opening I'd expected, but it was better than nothing. I nodded. "I know. You have. You've been wonderful, Bobby. I think most guys would write me off as crazy, but you've always been a good friend to me. I care so much about you; I would never want to upset you or hurt you."

I broke off because there were tears in his eyes. He blinked them away, but they left an unfamiliar shine in his eyes, as though the rich, earthy bronze had caught fire. "You say that. But you knew. You knew I wanted you to talk to me, and you didn't. And you knew how it would make me feel. God, do you know what it's like, getting one of those phone calls? Or being on duty and hearing it come over the radio? It's like I can't breathe." He stopped. He swallowed, and I realized, after a moment, he couldn't go on.

"I know—" I began.

"If you know, then why do you do it?" The words verged on a shout. From a long way off, filtering through my shock, I realized Bobby had finally reached the end of his remarkable control. "Maybe nobody's ever told you this before, so I'm going to tell you right now. That's a bad way to treat anybody, but it's a really bad way to treat—" His voice sounded scraped back, raw, scornful. "—a friend."

I could feel all the old signs: my scrambled thoughts, the feedback loop inside my head, the way words—which were always close—became distant. I'd talked about this enough, with enough therapists, to recognize that the pressure of the moment was creating panic, and the panic was taking my higher order brain functions offline, my body redirecting its energy to try to keep me alive.

"I thought you were mad at me," I managed to say. "I should have called, but I thought—I thought maybe you didn't want me to call you anymore."

"Why would I be mad at you?"

"The other night," I said. It was more like babbling—the words flowing out. "When you brought me home after I fell. I don't know—we were talking, and I thought I felt something, and—and Bobby, you're my best friend, and I was so afraid of screwing that up." I could hear myself. Hear the disjointed sentences, the gaps in logic, all the places I needed to say something more. Or something different. If it had been a story, I could have gone back and revised, but all I could do now was stumble forward, the words pouring out of me. "I thought maybe you wanted—I don't know. But I know I messed up. I got so scared, Bobby, and I know that's not an excuse, and I'm sorry I—I didn't say the right thing or do the right thing." The words I was playing it safe didn't quite make it to my lips, but somehow, I said, "I should have been braver."

I didn't understand the hurt I saw in Bobby's face. It was only visible for an instant. And then the hurt was gone, and the anger, and everything. And someone else was looking out at me. Trying to be patient. Trying to be kind. "I'm—I knew I shouldn't put you in that position. I knew—" He shook his head, ran one hand through his hair. It spilled over his fingers like silk, catching the light. "I am your friend, Dash. Nothing is going to change that. I'm sorry I made you feel uncomfortable. It won't happen again."

And this was it. The moment to be brave. I gathered my wits, took a deep breath, and prepared myself to say three words. Only three words. Three little words.

But somehow, Bobby spoke first. "When I saw you with Chester at the park, I thought—" He brushed something invisible from his shirt. "I don't know what I thought. I made a mistake, that's all. And I'm really sorry, because you're my best friend—"

"Bobby—"

He shook his head. "You don't have to say anything."

"No, please—"

"Dash, it's fine."

I opened my mouth.

A sound from his phone stopped me. The yowl of a cat. And even though it had been a long time, I recognized the sound of a notification from a dating app called Prowler. For an instant, Bobby looked guilty.

"Sorry," he mumbled, reaching into his pocket to silence his phone.

"You're on Prowler," I said.

He shrugged, and he didn't quite meet my eyes as he said, "Well, yeah, you know. You said it was a good idea."

"I did," I said, but it was like someone else was talking now. "I did say—" The pain was something far off: a pinprick light rushing down a long tunnel toward me. Some other person smiled with my face and said, "That's where you were."

He still wasn't looking at me.

"You were on a date," I said, and I wondered why my voice wasn't breaking.

"Just drinks," he mumbled.

And somehow, I sounded excited when I said, "Good. That's great."

"I don't know about great."

"Bobby, I'm so happy for you."

"It's pathetic," he said.

"It's not pathetic."

He shrugged again. His arms were folded more tightly across his chest, and he stared off at one of the many candlesticks. Like he was trying to make a joke, he said, "If he's a serial killer, I'm going to need you to bail me out."

Someone else was still smiling. Someone else laughed. "Keme and I will be ready for extraction."

But he still wouldn't look at me, and his voice was small as he said, "I just thought…I just thought I had to start sometime."

It felt like the end. But he didn't move. And I didn't move. And his eyes came up to mine, and for what I thought might be the final time, I saw a question there.

"I hope he's not a serial killer," I said, keeping my tone light. "I hope he's cute and funny, and I hope you order the most expensive thing on the menu. Lobster stuffed with steak stuffed with crab. And then deep fried. Ask if bottomless mashed potatoes are an option."

Bobby was still looking at me. But the question was gone now.

Somehow, I got back to my room. Somehow, I ended up in bed. The pain was barreling in, so big that I knew when it reached me, when all of it came crashing home, my body wouldn't be big enough to contain it. And it's your fault, a voice said inside my head. This is all your fault.

I took out my phone before I could think about it, and I texted Hugo, Happy Valentine's Day .