Chapter 78
NOW: Two Months Later
Bennett
The shouts are deafening. Paloma whistles loudly enough from the second row that I blush and shake my head at her.
Her eyes gleam—but she’s not the only one cheering, backed up by a chorus of my team and my family: Rhys and Sadie, Freddy and Ro, Holden and even Toren Kane, alongside Coach Harris, like they came together.
On Paloma’s right is Lily, while on her other side are Alessia and Adam, the former cheering at a more respectful volume while my dad shouts, hands cupped.
The only other people in the scarcely populated auditorium either look annoyed or are laughing with genuine surprise at the display. It makes sense. They’re treating a poetry reading like it’s the Stanley Cup finals.
They’re patient and slightly less enthused through the rest of the programming—but I’m thankful I went last in the reading, so my personal band of cheerleaders couldn’t dull the shine of my few classmates also reading.
Dr. Britton steps forward, smirking and shaking his head at me, before turning to give his closing remarks.
Everyone disperses. I step toward the front of the stage, maneuvering to sit on the lip while my family and friends all move forward to congratulate me. Rhys and Sadie arrive first, with Freddy next to them, arm locked around Ro.
“It was very beautiful,” Ro says, smiling sweetly. “You read it very well.”
Freddy groans. “He’s taller than both of us, cooks, and now he writes poetry?” His head tilts to Rhys’s shoulder. “He must be stopped.”
My best friend just smiles almost blindingly as he smacks his hand on my knee. “It was awesome, Ben. Seriously.”
“Your dad was crying,” Sadie mutters, smirking as she points with her chin to where my dad is drying his eyes and stepping forward to our circle. Behind him is Paloma Blake with a simple bouquet of white roses, peonies, and eucalyptus wrapped in newspaper.
She’s beautiful in a cream linen dress and denim jacket, with multicolored embroidery along the pockets.
All of it is thrifted, I know, because Paloma had been too excited about the find.
She’d taken her roommate on her first thrifting journey, but Lily was not a fan of wearing “other people’s clothes. ”
“Pretty words,” she says, stepping up in-between my legs, heeled brown boots clacking on the linoleum. I slide off the edge of the stage to stand in front of her, grabbing her in a tight hug, pressing a kiss to her cheek.
“Pretty hair,” I say, tangling my hand into the strands. “Are these for me?”
Paloma nods, pulling back and handing me the flowers. “For your first performance.”
“It’s a reading.”
She shrugs, a glint in her chocolate eyes. “It went perfect, you know? I’m . . . really proud of you.”
Like champagne bubbling through me, I grow brighter. “Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
I tuck her back to my chest, an arm around her to keep her body close. Our friends laugh and make plans. My dad squeezes my shoulder and nods; there are still tears in his eyes, but his smile is almost blinding.
“It was for you,” I whisper, leaning down to Paloma’s ear. “It always is.”
Her body relaxes further in my grip. “I know.”
· · ·
“If I had made a wager on who would be crying today, I would not have said Sadie Brown,” my dad mutters to me, stepping beside me with a short stack of boxes in his grip.
I stop my own movements to look, seeing Sadie, arms crossed, eyes squeezed closed as she almost hides next to my car. Like she’s desperately trying to keep it together before she sees Rhys.
“Hey,” I say, stepping up beside her.
“I know,” she snaps, but it’s half-hearted. “New York is only like four hours away and I can take the train. And it’s not that bad, I can visit whenever—”
I raise my hands, trying to quiet her growing volume.
“I wasn’t going to say anything like that.”
She looks at me then, cat-like eyes of gray reddened and sad. “I don’t want him to see that I’m upset—”
“You don’t have to have it together, you know, to be with him. To deserve him.” I run a hand through my hair. “You know that, right? Rhys was a mess when you found each other, and you fell in love with him anyway.”
Sadie chews on her lip, eyes darting toward the door where Rhys and Max both stand. My best friend locks his eyes on Sadie immediately, like a magnet, brow furrowing as he reads the distress she’s so desperately trying to hide.
“Besides,” I drop my voice as he heads across the lawn toward us. “I think crying because you’re going to miss your boyfriend is very normal behavior.”
“Hey. Everyone okay?”
Rhys eyes us both and I smile and step away, but not before giving him a quick nod—because I am okay.
Freddy steps up beside me as I head back into the house, flicking the brim of my backward hat playfully.
“So, I spoke to Paloma again,” Freddy says, nodding lightly at me. He mostly avoids my eyes, tapping his foot a little intensely. “I just wanted you to know. It was . . . good. Nice, to talk about it, I guess.”
He didn’t share the details, and neither did Paloma, but he’d asked to speak with her the other morning after family breakfast. The way Ro explained it to me, in her soft, gentle voice, Freddy and Paloma had something in common with their pasts.
Something that might allow them to find comfort in each other, at least somewhat.
I’d hugged Freddy when they returned to the table, which was something we’d never really done before.
“I’m glad you both have each other,” I say. He grins, all genuine and warm. He squeezes my shoulder and asks the same question Rhys asked mere moments ago.
“You good, Reiny?”
“Yeah.” I nod. “I’m good.”
My therapist and I spend a lot of time talking about my thought spirals—though they still plague me at times, they have become more manageable. I have a pathway or steps I can take to calm myself, which gives me the feeling of preparedness.
Last session, however, we’d discussed the upcoming changes: my friends all graduating and moving on, while I stayed at Waterfell for an extra semester to finish after changing my major.
But with Rhys and Freddy both leaving—one to play for the Rangers and one for Dallas—I decided to move out, too, to stay with my dad for the time being. Beacon Hill is a half hour from campus with no traffic, but I don’t mind dealing with it for the couple of months I have left.
And then . . . who knows what’s next? The thought would have filled me with pure anxiety four years ago. Now, I see my future and it’s bright; I just haven’t figured out the specifics. And that, I’m learning, is okay.
No one has to know who they are and what they want from life at twenty-one. It’s normal that I don’t.