Chapter 22 #2
I shook my head. “I thought I saw—never mind. It’s nothing.”
“Your face says it’s not nothing.”
“I’m not scared.”
His brow lifted. “Liar.”
“Fine, that was a big, fat lie. But legends aren’t real, right? They’re just as their name claims—legends.”
His eyes widened, and he tipped his head back to stare up at the night sky. “You saw the stars—”
“Shh!” I covered his mouth and looked around—for what, I had no idea. “You can’t say it out loud,” I hissed.
“Why not?” he asked, words muffled.
“Because then it’ll come true!”
He nipped at my fingers, and I jerked them away, flustered at the shock of chemistry that bolted through me.
His grin was wicked, but his eyes were steady. “You totally saw the Legend. And now you’re freaked out because you know what happened when my brothers did.”
“I’m happy for them,” I said. And I really was. “But I believe if you get it right once, when it breaks apart—and it always will, since everything does—you don’t get it back.”
He grimaced as if in pain. “You’re talking about your mom.”
Her death destroyed my family, and it still wasn’t the same.
I nodded. “And when you didn’t show up that night to go with me.
” I certainly hadn’t planned on saying that out loud, but I wouldn’t take it back.
We’d been best friends. More than best friends.
We’d become something I hadn’t had a name for back then, but he’d made it clear it wasn’t reciprocated. It had shattered me.
He had wrecked me.
“Hazel.” His voice was terrifyingly quiet and full of so much emotion, I choked up at just the sound of it. “I was packed.”
I stilled in shock, staring at him. “You were?”
He nodded.
“Then why didn’t you—”
“Show up?” He rubbed the back of his neck. “I couldn’t leave Kiera. I was the last barrier between her and Hank.”
The words penetrated, and it was like opening the shades to let the light in.
All the blame I’d shoved on him—the anger, the grief—flipped on its head.
Of course he couldn’t leave Kiera. She was fifteen.
And I hadn’t put the pieces together. How selfish I’d been to even ask him to run away with me in the first place.
I rubbed at the physical ache in my chest. “God, I’m so sorry,” I whispered hoarsely.
“So damn sorry, Tucker. I didn’t think—”
“You needed out. I got that.”
“But I didn’t even ask why you couldn’t come. I just assumed it meant I wasn’t enough.”
“You were always enough.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because you would’ve stayed. Or worse, you would have tried—and probably succeeded—in talking me into going, and I…I’d have hated myself. As much as I cared about you, I couldn’t leave Kiera. And I figured if you knew that, you’d hate me. So I said nothing, like a coward.”
“You’re the opposite of a coward, Tucker.
” The weight of his words settled over the night like a warm blanket, heavy but comforting in its truth.
A light wind rustled the trees, filling the silence, which was no longer oppressive but a space to breathe, to absorb what had been said.
“You really thought telling me the truth would change what we were?”
He let out a dry, humorless laugh, a storm of conflict in his hazel eyes. “What was I supposed to say? Please don’t go? I knew you couldn’t stay any more than I could come with. Plus…” He hesitated, his gaze flicking away. “I don’t have a history of good things staying good.”
God, I ached at the rawness in his voice, and I nodded. Because same. I had zero history of good things staying good.
But he was right about something else: “I would’ve stayed.”
With so much emotion in that hazel gaze, he nodded and cupped my face. “We were kids, Haze. And Kiera, she was only fifteen. She needed me. I couldn’t leave her. Not even for you.”
“That nearly killed me, but I understand now.”
“I know it must feel like I put Kiera in front of you, but I had no choice. I needed her to be okay. I was bound by ties and promises, but you weren’t, and I—I needed you to have a shot at something better than Star Falls.
I should’ve found a way to be there that night,” he said.
“But Kiera was messing around in the kitchen and broke the coffeepot. I took the blame, and Hank wouldn’t let me leave. ”
I ached for Past Tucker. I ached for Past Hazel. But we couldn’t change the past. “We were so young,” I finally said. “The odds were against us anyway.” I shrugged, a much lighter gesture than I felt. “And we both know, once something’s broken, it can’t be repaired.”
He looked at me for a long moment. “I used to think that was true. But look at Ryder and Caleb. They found the real thing.”
“So…you believe in love now?”
He didn’t hesitate. “Yes.”
“Because you saw three stars?”
“Because I saw you again.”
The words hit me like a wave. I couldn’t breathe.
“Hank’s with Caleb,” he said. “You’re cold. Go inside; you’ll be safe and warm.”
“You just don’t want me to sleep in my van.”
“I don’t want you to go sleep in your van.”
There’d been a time I’d defended the van like it was my fortress. My freedom. But maybe it’d really been a hiding place. A mobile apology for taking up space. And I was getting tired of apologizing.
I met his gaze. “‘Just friends’ don’t go feral for each other’s safety.”
He winced as if I’d hit him. “Fuck, I knew that would bite me in the ass,” he said flatly. “And I get that I asked for this when I let my brothers get under my skin the other night. But you need to know, I didn’t mean it. Any of it. I’ve been trying to tell you—”
“Maybe it’s better this way,” I said, but it came out thin. Unconvincing. Like I didn’t believe it at all.
“Haze—”
“Night, Tucker.”
And then I did what it turns out I did best: I walked away and didn’t look back.