Chapter 27

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A life worth living for.

Rowan

Last night haunts me. In so many ways. After spending hours sleeplessly reviewing everything that happened and reaching conclusions that made breathing both easier and harder, sitting here—surrounded by such effortless peace—feels surreal.

With the way I was raised, it makes sense why I've never once caught fireflies before. But given how tranquil it is, I can't believe I've never thought to at least come out here and watch them.

From the pavilion steps, I watch Briar, Chip, and Lace lunge after the tiny glowing bugs, encompassed by glittering light. As old as we are, it all seems so outlandish.

My hands tighten around the mason jar Briar gave me not ten minutes ago. Mesh cloth and a rubber band take the place of a lid. Inside, a dozen or more fireflies peruse their prison, gleaming faintly in the dusk.

I don't know what Briar and Lace discussed earlier today that was so urgent. Right now, I couldn't care less. After last night, after looking down at the woman I love as she begged me to kill her, all I care about is finding moments like these. Moments with the people I care about. Just an hour ago, I wouldn't have been able to imagine this. Now, I can't picture a life without the memory.

Lowering my attention, I peer into my jar and let my mind drift to the other person in my world who I care about.

Corbin.

Hours after our fight, when I'd had some time to review, process, panic, review some more, and regret, I tried to find him. Explain myself. Apologize for reacting the way I did. But he was gone and he wasn't picking up the phone, and he still hasn't returned my calls.

I don't know if he's okay.

I wish I knew where he was.

Before I can decide whether or not I'm going to try calling him again, Chip plops onto the step beside me holding an overcrowded jar of scrambling hostages. With his short, curly hair swept up into a tiny bun, he looks ridiculous, and I don't know where he, his wife, or Briar get all their energy from.

"You gonna catch any, Boss?" he asks.

I lift my jar. "I have my best man on the task."

Chip watches me for one, long, chilling moment, then he whispers at his jar of fireflies, "Should we tell him Bossette isn't a man? No? Fair." Reclining, he drops the conspiratorial tone in favor of a brilliant smile. "Always best to let the delusional remain in their merry worlds for as long as they can."

Delusional, huh?

I wonder how much of last night got back to him and Lace. They're all close. Really close.

A kind of close I don't think I've ever dreamed of.

The more I get to know Briar's friends, the more I understand why they work so well together. They operate on the same wavelength, bursting with the same inexplicable energy. Each of them carries this just escaped from an institution edge that I can't explain. And I'm not certain I want to try.

Somehow, they've figured out how to be themselves without a single drop of shame.

For someone like me, being around people like them is comforting.

Even if I am all the horrible things Briar said last night, if they don't have to be ashamed of their horrible things, why should I be? It's like Briar told me, once. Here, there's no wrong answers. If we're all bad, we don't need to fear being worse.

My eyes trace back to Briar, who's leaping for a firefly that drifted out of her reach. The tiny creature slips through her fingers, and her expression turns distraught a moment before Lace's hand falls on her shoulder. The taller woman nods. Then she bounds into the air, swipes, and presents her quarry with the smuggest look I've ever seen etched across a person's face.

Beside me, also watching, Chip sighs. "My wife is amazing, and I love her."

In a field full of fireflies, she caught the least convenient one. Eyeing him, I mutter, "Yeah, she's something else."

Still bright and lovesick as ever, Chip tilts his head my way. Conversationally, he says, "Just so you know, I'll do worse than murder for those girls. If you hurt my bossette, I'll strip layers of your skin off to make hyper-realistic dolls, slowly surrounding you with them until you go insane."

What…the f—

I exhale the swear in my head and release it. Nope. Not even surprised. Disturbed, sure, but not surprised. I should commend him on the creativity. Most of the threats I hear fall somewhere between mundane and tired. Props to him for threatening outside the box. Scrubbing my eyes, I murmur, "How'd you get tied up in this world?"

He hums. "Took my oath ten or more years back. I was seventeen. On the streets. Briar's father pulled up where I was panhandling and told me to get in. I met Briar and Lace in the backseat where Lace told me she'd remove my liver if I ogled the young bossette. I've been smitten ever since."

I trace the raised line of a letter on my mason jar. "Homicidal tendencies is an interesting trait to favor."

Chip grins, all dimples, and rustles his curly hair as a warm breeze drifts by. "I can still picture them in that moment—night and day. Lace done up with curls in ivory. Briar hardly wearing two scraps of leather."

My brow furrows as I take in the stark opposite descriptions before me now. Even though I gave Briar the least frilly of her dresses to wear this morning, it is still pastel and elegant. While, beside her, Lace looks like a punk rocker. "What?"

"Oh, sure. Briar's always gone back and forth between being a pretty princess and an emo nightmare every other day, but Lace goes through phases. At one point, she opted to look like a porcelain doll while making grown men cry."

…girls will be girls, I guess.

Chip swears. "I got addicted to the way she explores being alive. I still am." Setting his jar down, he rests back on his palms. "When you have nothing, you fall easy. If someone catches you—even for just a moment—you don't stop falling." Chip's smile fades. The last glow of dusk catches and holds in his eyes, drawing on the lightest shades of green in his irises. "Briar's never been in love before, Boss."

My fingers flinch against my jar.

"Please trust that she's kind. No matter what happens. She's a good girl. She does her very best. But, in a lot of ways, she doesn't have a clue." Breath fills him, releasing slowly. "Just look at her."

I do. The sky's darkened since we came out her. The world's laced in lavender shadows and navy trim. In the inky space broken only by glittering flecks, she's gold.

Right now, last night didn't happen.

Everything bad is a world away.

The darkness itself cowers.

Once again, she's sun on my skin, and I'm burning.

"She doesn't even know she's lonely," Chip says before I'm too far gone in the trance.

His words break the spell, and I turn to him. "Lonely?"

"Almost as lonely as you, if I had to guess. Except I don't think you're in denial like she is."

At least I'm not as lonely these days, now that my home feels a little less like a minefield. Having someone with me all night for weeks on end changes things. Being near someone, touching someone, holding someone, creates a healthier brain. Before her, my mind itself was starved. "What makes you think she's lonely?"

Chip nudges my shoulder, half-smiling at me. "Every reason you think she isn't. She's surrounded by people who look up to her. She's important by consequence, not choice. Her best friends fell in love with each other, leaving her to be the perpetual third. Without her parents around, she's nobodies' first. People may be willing to die for her, but that doesn't mean they know her favorite color or that she always gets vanilla ice cream or what her favorite animal is or that she names all her knives. It's a different sort of loneliness when you're the only one like you in a crowded room."

Kill me. My eyes close as my chests constricts.

Clapping his hands against his thighs, Chip stands. "Welp. I'm sure everything'll work itself out, though. Do you know why?"

With Briar's tear-streaked face blazing in the back of my mind, I murmur, "Why?"

He swipes his jar of fireflies off the ground. "For better or worse, every event in your life so far has." Tossing the jar to me, he smiles. "And if this is the moment where you've ended up? I think it's safe to say they've mostly worked out for the better. Wouldn't you?"

My fingers tense around his jar, but he doesn't wait for me to answer before he jogs back out into the field.

Flashes of pain, suffering, and agony compose my childhood. The years linger like wraiths in the back of my mind, haunting the space between my skin and my muscles. Horrors fill my bloodstream. A history of violence consumes more of my waking moments than the monsters in my nightmares.

So many times I've wished I were never born.

But every single one of those events…led here.

My body constricts, and I bite my cheek until the all-too-familiar taste of blood floods into my mouth. Uttering a curse, I force down an iron-tinged swallow, clutch both jars together and try to breathe.

Despite everything, I like it here.

Here is worth protecting.

Here is good.