Chapter Seventeen

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Milo

I woke to an empty bed. Starlet was nowhere to be found. An instant knot of worry built inside my gut as I became concerned that she regretted the night prior. I’d never truly cared about rejection until that very moment.

The night before was one of the best nights I’d had in a long time. I’d daydreamed about tasting every inch of Starlet since the first night we’d met. The only difference between when we first hooked up compared to last night was, well…everything. I felt everything for Starlet Evans. I felt more than I knew a coldhearted person like me could feel for another person.

I rubbed the exhaustion out of my eyes. Whenever I woke up, there were a few seconds of darkness, even when my eyes were fully open. It took a few moments for my vision to reappear, and when I saw Starlet wasn’t there, I feared she’d returned to reality and realized what had happened the night prior was a mistake for her.

That was my ultimate fear—her realizing I was nothing more than a mistake.

Before my mind could trauma dump its toxic thoughts of me being unworthy, the hotel door opened, and Starlet walked in with a tray of coffee and muffins.

“Good morning, sunshine.” She smiled brightly, bundled up in her winter gear.

A sigh rolled through my system. She came back.

“Morning,” I muttered, rubbing my eyes once more as I sat up in bed. “What time is it?”

“A little past nine. You’re a good sleeper.”

“How long have you been up?”

“Since around six. I figured I’d get an early hike in and watch the sunrise.”

“You’ve been hiking already? This morning?”

She nodded as she placed the tray of goods down. She then took off her coat and shoes. “What can I say? You unlocked my love of hiking. I just needed to see what the sunrise looked like this morning before we headed back to town.”

“I would’ve gone with you. You could’ve woken me up.”

She grabbed a muffin and coffee and approached me. She placed it on the desk beside the bed and leaned in to kiss me. It felt good to know we were still kissing. I somewhat feared that when the sun came up, the kissing between us would stop.

“You looked too cute sleeping. I didn’t want to wake you up. Besides, I had to make sure everything was in order for our last activity today before we headed back home.”

I raised an eyebrow. “Last activity?”

She smiled widely, and her doe eyes sparkled with excitement. “How do you feel about surprises?”

“Hate everything about them.”

She frowned slightly. “Oh. Well, how do you feel about surprises from me?”

I grinned and pulled her into my chest, kissing her on the forehead. “I could become a fan of those kinds of surprises.”

***

Ice fishing.

She took me ice fishing.

Not only did she manage to find a spot on the water, rent a four-wheeler to get us on the ice, and get all the equipment necessary for the adventure but she even cut up the bait for us to use.

“I can’t believe you did all of this,” I said, a tad bit speechless at the thought that Starlet put into this activity to make it come to play.

“There was a fifty-fifty chance you would’ve hated the idea, and this all blew up in my face, and we had a very awkward, quiet ride home, but I wanted you to have a moment to feel close to your mother the way you made me feel close to mine on the hike.”

I understood that a woman couldn’t cure a person’s depression. But dammit, did Starlet make it a little easier to breathe.

It took everything inside me not to get choked up in my emotions as we sat out there on the ice for a few hours.

We didn’t catch any fish, but I caught a whole shit ton of feelings for a woman who came into my life at a time I needed someone the most.

If I had the opportunity, I would’ve stayed on the ice with her for a million more hours. I would’ve asked her more and more questions about her life, her dreams, and her goals. I would’ve laughed at her trying to untangle her fishing rod and smiled at her when she wasn’t even looking my way. I would’ve run my fingers against her cheeks and kissed her dimples. I would’ve told her how she scared me shitless because she made me feel. That woman made me, the cold soul of winter, feel again.

You would’ve loved her, Mom.

You would’ve loved her more than you loved me.

As that thought crossed my mind, a light breeze pushed through, hitting my face. It was as if Mom were replying to me with the words, “Never a chance I’d love someone more.”

She used to say that to me all the time when I was a kid. She’d put me to bed at night, tuck me in, and press our foreheads together. She’d say, “I love you, my Milo Antonio. Never a chance I’d love someone more.”

“You do that a lot,” Starlet mentioned as we sat in our chairs on the ice.

“Hmm?”

“You mumble to yourself.”

I hadn’t known she’d noticed. My brows knitted, and I shook my head. “Not to myself. To my mom. I still talk to her.”

“Good,” Starlet said as she reeled up her fishing rod a bit. “That’s good.”

That’s good.

What an odd reaction to learning that someone still spoke to their dead mother.

“Star?”

“Yes?”

“You’re really weird.”

She laughed, and I wanted to swim in the sound. “I am really freaking weird.”

“Good,” I said, nudging her. “That’s good.” I stared at her closer and narrowed my eyes. She was shivering. “Are you freezing your ass off right now?”

“Oh gosh, yeah. I’m pretty sure I lost feeling in my left butt cheek like thirty minutes ago.”

“Geez, Star, you should’ve said something. Let’s get going.”

“No, no, it’s fine, I’m fine,” she said through gritted, chattering teeth. “This is great.”

I smirked at how she was trying her best to push through, but I knew it was time to go. I started packing our things, and we headed back to the car. After loading everything up, I walked over to Starlet and pulled her into a hug. I held her for longer than normal because I hadn’t had an actual hug in the longest time. The last time my arms wrapped around a person like that was when I held my mother to say our final goodbye. It had been over a year. A year since my arms wrapped around another person. A year since I had true, authentic comfort from a person. I didn’t know how much I’d missed that interaction until it was upon me.

My body engulfed hers as her heat sank into me. The smell of her hair filled my nose as my arms banded around her. My hold was tight enough to matter yet not restrained enough to constrict her freeness. It felt as if her goodness was being transferred into my soul, and I was giving her the best parts of me in equal measure. I didn’t know I still had that. I didn’t know my spirit still had good parts to share.

“Thank you for today,” I told her. “I needed today.”

“I think I needed this weekend,” she agreed. “I needed you.”

I pressed my forehead to hers and closed my eyes. “If there’s an afterlife, do you think our moms are friends?”

“Yes,” she quickly replied. “And I think they sent us to one another.”

I kissed her and felt the reality begin to settle in that I wouldn’t be able to do that freely once we returned to town. “Can I tell you a secret?”

“Yes,” she softly said, her warm breaths melting against my skin.

“I already miss you, and you’re still here.”

She inched in closer, pressing her body against mine, resting her head against my chest. “Can I tell you a secret?”

“Yes.”

“I missed you before I knew you existed.”

***

I drove the first few hours before nightfall, and Starlet finished up the ride home, pulling into my driveway a little after eleven o’clock. The only light that existed around the house was the front porch light, which always stayed on. Mom was the one who used to shut it off each night, but after she passed away, neither Dad nor I took on that responsibility.

Starlet shut off her car engine, and we sat quietly in the car for a few moments.

Neither one of us talked about what the transition of our return to town would look like. We didn’t discuss what was on and off-limits with our newfound secret friendship.

All we knew was that we couldn’t do what we’d done for the past two days.

“What now?” she asked, turning to look at me.

Her brown eyes seemed so sad, and I hated that. I never wanted her to look at me with sadness in her eyes. Some people’s eyes were built for sadness, but Starlet’s weren’t. They were built for smiles, laughter, and joy.

“I don’t know,” I told her. “But I know the second I get out of this car, everything has to change. And I don’t want it to change.”

She placed her hand against the console between us, and I placed my hand on top of hers. “Maybe we just act normal. Like friends,” she offered.

“I don’t normally eat my friends out for dessert,” I joked.

“Milo,” she scolded, growing bashful. “I mean it. We can’t do what we’ve done. It’s too risky.”

“Yeah. I know.” I brought her hand to my mouth and kissed her palm. “So tell me what to do, Teach.”

Her lips trembled for a second, and her eyes flashed with emotions, yet she didn’t cry. “You’ll show up at school and pretend I don’t exist. I’ll do the same. Then we’ll meet in the library, and you’ll bring your sarcastic comments like before, and we’ll be who we were before we became…who we are.”

“When do we get to be who we are again?”

Her breath caught.

She didn’t answer.

My heart caught.

I stayed quiet.

“I’m sorry, Milo. I…we have to get you through these next few months and graduation.”

“Ninety-three days,” I said. “Ninety-three days until you’re mine.”

She raised an eyebrow. “You’ve done the math?”

I nodded. “I’ve done the math.”

She bit her bottom lip, and a few stubborn tears rolled down her cheeks. “Everything in my head is telling me this is wrong. That I’m supposed to be smarter and not fall for you, not feel what I’m feeling, but my heart…it feels everything, and I don’t know how to shut that off, and I don’t think I want to, but I know this isn’t supposed to feel so right. But it does. You feel right to me, Milo. And that scares me. And it’s not fair of me to expect you to wait these next three months for us to figure out what we can be. That seems like a very selfish thing for me to ask you to do.”

I was still holding her hand. I wasn’t sure if I’d be able to let it go.

“Starlet…I need you to understand something. Before you, I was sleepwalking through the coldest winter of my life. I wasn’t sure I’d be able to make it through. Then you came and saved me. So believe me when I say I can wait until spring to feel you again. I can wait until spring to make you mine.”

She leaned toward me and kissed me.

Her lips against mine, her unspoken truths falling into me through her taste.

We tried to kiss in that very moment, yet it felt like goodbye.

I wished it hadn’t.

I wasn’t ready for goodbye, not with her, at least, never with her.

We stayed connected as long as we could before I opened the door and said good night.

As she pulled away that evening, she didn’t know it, but she took pieces of my heart along with her. I didn’t mind. I knew if anyone would keep them safe, it would be her.

“She’s the one, Mom,” I muttered as I grabbed my suitcase.

The wind hit my face as if Mom said, “I know.”