14. Dallas
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Dallas
Faith walks out of Spurs Diner, snow drifting in lazy flakes around her, catching in her hair and melting into her jacket, but she doesn’t seem to notice any of it. Her arms fold around her ribs, holding herself together with sheer will.
I know that feeling too well.
Jet hollers something about “bringing my girl back for pie, or I’ll come get her,” from the door, and Faith laughs, shaking her head.
“You hear that?” I say.
Faith snorts. “Jet considers pie a legally binding contract.”
“I should be worried,” I mutter. “She sounds organized.”
“She’s terrifying,” Faith agrees solemnly. “You’ll survive. Probably.”
But all the noise falls away when Faith looks at me.
“Do you want to walk a bit?” I hear myself ask.
She hesitates, glancing back at the diner windows still glowing warm behind us. “Just for a few minutes?”
“As long as you want.”
Her shoulders ease, like I said the right thing without knowing it. “Okay. Then yeah.”
We fall into step down Main Street, side by side, as if no time has passed at all. Snow crunches beneath our boots, and every now and then her sleeve brushes mine, sending a jolt through me I can’t seem to get used to.
“I forgot how dramatic this town gets about snow,” Faith says.
“You say that like you didn’t love it.”
She glances at me. “I loved it when I didn’t have to shovel.”
“That’s why you were friends with me,” I say. “Manual labor access. Well, anyway, Jet seemed really happy to see you,” I say.
Faith lets out a soft laugh. “Jet is… Jet. She never wanted anything from me except me. It felt good. Like breathing again.” A pause. “I missed her. I missed all of this.”
“All of this,” I repeat quietly.
She nods. “I didn’t realize how much I missed it until I was standing in that booth again. Like some version of me woke up.”
My chest tightens. “The good version?”
She gives a sad little smile. “The real one.”
My insides twist.
Faith walks closer. Close enough I can smell her shampoo, see the steam rising off her breath in slow curls. It’s too easy to slip into old rhythms, old versions of myself I thought I buried years ago.
We turn toward Town Square, the Christmas lights glowing warm across the snow. The big tree in the center flickers with silver ribbon and uneven student-made ornaments.
“That one looks like a snowman,” Faith says, squinting.
“That is not a snowman.”
“It has eyes.”
“So does a potato,” I say. “If you put eyes on it….”
She laughs. “You’re just mad because Buckhorn’s artistic vision hasn’t evolved.”
“I will not be shamed by a macaroni angel,” I say gravely.
Faith continues walking.
“It’s beautiful,” she whispers, and I realize I’m not looking at the tree when she says it. I’m looking at her instead, the glow of the lights catching in her eyes, the quiet wonder on her face undoing me far more than the decorations ever could.
She catches me staring, and she doesn’t look away.
“What?” she asks softly.
“Nothing,” I say, too fast.
She watches me, then nods, like she understands there’s more I’m not saying.
My chest tightens.
We walk again, circling the square. People wave. A kid sleds off a small snowbank and faceplants. Faith laughs softly, and I swear something in me unclenches just hearing it.
Then she says, “Lila.”
Instantly, my throat goes tight.
“She’s… wonderful,” Faith says. “The sweetest kid I’ve ever met. You’re doing an amazing job with her.”
Heat creeps up my spine. “She is everything. My whole world.”
“She adores you,” Faith says quietly.
My chest warms painfully. Her voice is so tender it nearly undoes me.
“She’s getting so big,” I murmur. “She’s curious. Always asking questions. Belinda loved that. She thought education was everything and wanted Lila to learn, explore, grow.” I smile faintly. “I try to keep that alive for her.”
Faith’s expression softens, tender and knowing. “Belinda sounds like she was incredible.”
I nod once. “She was.”
Snow swirls around us as we walk past the courthouse. Our shoulders brush again, and this time our hands swing close.
We’re too close now, close enough that my knuckles skim the edge of her glove. A bolt of heat shoots up my arm, fierce and fast and blinding, like my body remembered something my mind is still trying to deny.
Her breath catches.
Her fingers twitch.
For a second, our hands move toward each other as magnets finally remembering how to work.
I pull back.
Too fast.
Too obvious.
She swallows hard, and I pretend not to notice how her eyes drop to the ground.
The disappointment that crosses her face is a punch to my sternum.
“Sorry,” I mutter.
“You don’t have to apologize,” she whispers.
But the moment stretches taut between us anyway. It could snap or pull us closer. I don’t know which scares me more.
We reach the far side of the square. Faith breaks quietly through the cold.
“Do you miss her?”
Belinda.
I breathe out. “Every day.”
“You don’t have to talk about it.”
But I want to. With Faith, I want to.
“She was bright,” I say. “Messy. Brave. She dragged joy into every room with her. When she got sick… it felt like the colors drained out of everything. I kept thinking if I pushed harder, prayed harder, held on tighter…” My voice drops. “But some things don’t care how tight you hold.”
Faith’s hand brushes my sleeve, light as snowfall. It’s the gentlest touch, but it lands as heat straight to the center of my chest.
“You didn’t fail her,” she whispers.
I close my eyes.
Because that hurts.
Because it helps.
Because she shouldn’t say things that make me able to breathe again.
I look at her, and the warmth in her eyes, the softness, the way she’s seeing me nearly buckles my knees.
This is exactly why I can’t do this, why being around her is dangerous in ways I don’t trust myself to manage. It’s too easy to forget the rules I’ve built, too easy to want things I can’t have, to picture a life I don’t deserve after everything that’s already been taken.
I step back, just enough that her hand slips away.
Her face flickers with disappointment, confusion, and hurt, but she hides it fast.
“I should get back,” I say, roughly. “Mom’ll think I fell into a snowdrift.”
“Of course.” Her smile is small. Fragile. “Thanks for walking with me.”
“Thank you,” I say. “For… talking.”
She nods. “Yeah.”
I turn, but her voice stops me.
“Dallas?”
I look back.
She stands there, eyes soft and uncertain and wanting. A fist squeezing around my heart.
“Take care of yourself,” she says. “Not just Lila. You.”
My breath stumbles.
Damn, she shouldn’t look at me like that.
“Yeah,” I manage. “You too.”
I force myself to turn away.
Force myself to walk.
I don’t look back.
Because if I do, I’ll stay.
I know it.
Every cell in my body knows it.
And I can’t stay.
Not when wanting her again leaves me standing on the edge of a wildfire I won’t survive.