Chapter 51
Ashby
Milow dropped her pencil, grinning as she threw her hands into the air before signing, [Done.]
“Goddammit! Again?” I sighed and shook my head, letting my own pencil fall onto the bed.
“How is that even possible? I swear, your brain has some superpower.” I stared down at the Sudoku books in our laps.
Hers was a ‘pro’ level, mine for beginners—the one she had started years ago but had gotten bored soon after.
It had been her idea to race, and at first, we’d both solved easy ones.
Of course, she’d crushed me there, and I’d been na?ve enough to think I might have a chance if she moved up to a hard one. I didn’t.
“Honestly, Milow, your brain needs to be studied. That wasn’t even ten minutes.”
She grinned proudly, clasping her hands to her chest. She glanced down at the puzzle I was failing to solve. [You were close.]
I frowned. “I managed to find all the 4’s and 9’s.”
[Exactly. That’s a good start.] She smiled and leaned forward, pressing a soft kiss to my cheek. [You finish that one, and I’ll do another hard one.]
As fun as that sounded, I had a much better idea. I pushed our books and pencils aside, then moved toward her, easing her back to lie against the pillows. I positioned myself between her legs and braced on my elbows above her.
I looked down at her, at the way her hair was fanned out on the pillow, and at the proud, playful smirk still on her lips from her victory. My gaze dropped to her mouth, and all thoughts of numbers completely vanished. There was only her.
“You have a beautiful mind, and even more beautiful soul, Milow.”
Her smirk turned into a smile, and she tilted her head slightly to the side, trying to hide her shyness.
I leaned down and kissed her cheek. “You’ve known me for years. There’s no reason for you to get shy around me anymore.”
I trailed kisses along her jaw and down her neck, and I felt her body tense just a little before her hands came up to my hair.
I knew that it was still hard for her to believe any compliment thrown her way, but I needed her to understand that every word was true.
That I saw all of her. The brilliant, quiet girl who dominated every class and the strong, resilient girl who had survived so much.
And I loved every single part of her completely and without hesitation.
Moving up again, I captured her lips with mine.
It was a soft kiss at first, but then her legs angled on my sides, pulling me closer, and a low groan rumbled in my chest. I deepened the kiss, my tongue tracing the seam of her lips until she parted them for me.
I explored her mouth slowly, savoring her taste.
My body began to move on its own. I rocked my hips against hers, and the friction sent a jolt straight through me.
I was already getting hard, but I forced myself to go slow.
I did it again, pushing my growing erection against the soft heat between her legs, letting her feel exactly what she did to me.
Her back arched instinctively to meet me, and her grip in my hair tightened, holding me to her as she rocked her hips up to match my rhythm. I pulled back just enough to whisper against her lips, my voice thick. "God, you feel so good, Milow. I'm so crazy about you."
Then I crashed my mouth back on hers, knowing this was all we could do for now. I couldn’t push her, and I didn’t want to ruin something special just because I was too selfish to wait. I could control myself a while longer. For her.
__
Tuesday, December 16th
We sat at our usual table in the cafeteria at lunch, and the second Lacey joined us, the mood shifted. Everyone went quiet. Even Stan.
That alone said enough.
We all looked between her and Jasper, trying to figure out what had happened. They had been dating since September, and from the outside, it had looked steady. Jasper took her on dates, walked her to class, and sometimes they moved through the halls hand in hand.
Today, he barely looked at her. His focus stayed on his food. Lacey, on the other hand, looked furious. Her jaw was tight and her shoulders stiff. She didn’t try to hide it.
Stan let out a low whistle and popped another grape into his mouth. “So… are we breaking up now or after lunch? Because I got popcorn in my backpack.”
Lacey glared at him, but Jasper didn’t react. He kept staring down.
“Dude,” Ashby muttered, shooting Stan a warning look.
“What?” Stan shrugged, glancing between them again. “There’s clearly trouble in paradise. I know the signs. You two look exactly like Scottie and me when we kept fighting every other week.”
They never really fought. There had been tension, but it never turned into a real fight. It never became something they couldn’t fix. And I knew whatever was happening between Jasper and Lacey wouldn’t explode into some loud scene in the middle of the cafeteria either.
Jasper was too calm and collected for that.
My eyes drifted to the empty seat beside Stan.
He sat at the end of the table alone today.
Scottie had stayed home because she felt dizzy and sick again, and none of us liked that.
We had thought things were better after she fainted a few weeks ago.
We had told ourselves it was a one-time thing, maybe because of stress or not drinking enough water.
But now she was tired and dizzy all the time, and I couldn’t shake the feeling that whatever had caused her to faint in the first place had never really been figured out.
It didn’t feel as simple as the doctors had made it sound.
They had brushed it off too easily. Still, I knew Scarlett wouldn’t ignore it.
She would keep pushing. She would make sure Scottie got checked again and again until someone gave her a real answer.
“Do you guys want to talk about it?” Ashby asked. His hand rested on my thigh under the table, and I had placed mine over his, slowly tracing my thumb over his skin. “We’re here if you need us.”
Jasper shook his head, his eyes still fixed on his food. Lacey looked at him, and something in her expression snapped.
I flinched when she slammed both hands onto the table, making our drinks shake from the force. She stood, fists tight at her sides, before she grabbed her backpack. “Instead of sitting there and saying nothing, maybe you should man up and tell me what you’re actually thinking.”
Then she walked away, leaving all of us staring after her.
“Jesus…” Stan muttered. “What the hell did you do, dude?”
Jasper finally looked up. With Lacey gone, his shoulders dropped, and he looked relieved. “I didn’t do anything.”
I believed him.
I reached across the table and squeezed his hand gently, offering him a smile. When he met my eyes, I signed, [We’re here for you.]
He glanced at Ashby.
“She says we’re here for you,” Ashby translated.
Jasper smiled tightly and nodded. “Thanks, Milow. I, uh…” He ran a hand through his blond hair and tugged at the ends before letting out a heavy sigh. “Do you guys want to hang out tonight? I know it’s a school night, and—”
“I’ll hang out with you even if I had finals tomorrow,” Stan cut in.
Jasper let out a quiet laugh. “I know.” His gaze moved between the three of us, but the smile never reached his eyes. “I just need a distraction. We could hang out in the attic. Order pizza or something.”
[I’m in,] I signed right away.
Ashby nodded. “Yeah. I’m in too.”
“I’ll bring ice cream,” Stan said, reaching over to squeeze Jasper’s shoulder. “The expensive, artisanal kind. We’re not half-assing this.”
“Thanks. I really appreciate you guys.”
“Any time,” Ashby said firmly.
His arm slid around me, and I leaned into him, resting my head against his shoulder. He kissed the top of my head and rubbed my back while I watched Jasper stand and gather his barely touched lunch.
“All right. I’ll see you guys tonight. Six okay?” he asked.
“Yeah. Six is good,” Ashby replied.
“Love you, dude,” Stan said as he stood and pulled Jasper into a quick hug.
Jasper hugged him back just as tight. “Love you too.”
I watched them, and the sight of how close they were—and always had been—made my chest warm. All the friendships we shared were so much bigger than any little inconvenience.
We showed up for each other, and we always stayed. And we never let each other sit alone with things that felt too heavy to handle alone.
But when Jasper walked away, a heavy feeling lingered in my heart. I found myself thinking about what Scottie had said last week: that strange feeling when everything looks fine on the surface, yet somewhere deep inside there is a quiet expectation that something is about to go wrong.
For a brief moment, the thought tried to settle in my mind, trying to connect everything that was happening around me into something bigger and darker.
But I forced myself not to follow it.
I didn’t want to start searching for cracks before they were truly there, and I didn’t want to turn normal problems into signs of something worse. And most of all, I refused to believe that just because I feared something falling apart, it meant it actually would.
__
“Have you guys heard from Bennett?” Jasper asked. He sat on one of the three couches in the attic, with a carton of pizza balanced on his lap.
I had only been to Jasper’s house once before, but I remembered how big it was.
The attic was not really an attic. It felt more like a small apartment built above the main house, with a kitchenette along one wall, a bathroom tucked behind a white door, and a separate bedroom at the end of a short hallway.
It was quiet up here, and it was all Jasper’s.
I sat next to Ashby on the couch across from Jasper, my leg pressed against his as I ate my pizza and listened.
“No. He’s been avoiding me,” Ashby said with a small shrug.
“Yeah, me too,” Stan added from the armchair. “I don’t think he’ll be apologizing to Milow any time soon.”
I wasn’t expecting Bennett to apologize. It would be nice, sure, but I wasn’t going to chase it.
The room fell quiet for a moment. The TV played in the background with some random show none of us were really watching.
Then Jasper straightened, letting out a long breath as he shook his head.
“It feels like we’ve all somehow been in a terrible accident, died, and woke back up in hell. Life feels so fucking strange lately.”
He felt it too. It wasn’t just Scottie. It wasn’t just me. Something had shifted. I could feel it deep in my bones, like a dark cloud trailing behind us, feeling closer to some of us than others.
“Mom said something about the moon and the stars,” Stan said, taking another bite of his pizza. He chewed and swallowed, then waved his slice in the air. “You know she’s into astrology and all that. She told me last week that there’s been some huge shift in the universe or whatever.”
I pressed my lips together. I had never cared much about astrology.
I liked things that made sense. Things you could explain.
But with Stan’s mom saying something like that, I had no choice but to believe it.
It was easier to blame the stars than to accept that sometimes life just tilted without warning.
[Maybe it’s just a rough phase,] I signed, and Ashby translated.
“Yeah,” Jasper said quietly. “Maybe.”
Stan reached for the ice cream he had brought and took a spoonful, mixing his dinner with dessert. “Either way, we survive it. We always do. We stick together and help each other out, no matter what.”
“That’s right,” Ashby said, his smile encouraging. Then he looked at me and squeezed my knee. “We got each other.”
I smiled back at him, leaning into his side.
Whatever life was about to throw our way, we’d manage and get through it. And in the end, I knew things would always get better.