Chapter 39
thirty-nine
. . .
Witt
If we ever happen to cross paths...
I wonder if we'll feel it immediately.
Like we've always known each other.
It sounds like something from a rom-com.
I've only watched a few with my sister.
No judgments.
The whisper of stationary sliding across cotton sheets has a distinct sound. The crackle of envelopes opened so many times the folds have become soft.
For ten years, I've kept every single letter.
Some are folded into perfect squares.
Some have coffee stains still in the envelopes.
One still smells faintly like vanilla.
Tonight they cover my bed.
Letters.
Journal pages.
Envelopes.
Ten years of conversations with a girl I'd never met.
Or so I'd believed.
I move another page aside, then another, my fingers brushing over ten years of conversations I'd never been able to throw away.
I'd always told myself I kept them because they mattered.
Because Rune mattered. But now my pulse pounds against my ribs with every page I turn, and I finally understand there was another reason.
Somewhere in these letters is the sentence that just made my heart stutter in the middle of a football game.
The sentence Maci said as casually as if she'd been saying it her entire life.
It couldn't be.
Except, what if it could?
My brain wants evidence. My heart already knows the answer.
I pick up a letter from three years ago, when I was telling her I failed.
Could this be the one?
The front door opens.
"I swear Annika is trying to kill Parker." Maci laughs to herself as she walks inside. "Her rehearsal dinner dress is ridiculously sexy. That girl has enough cleavage to distract an entire football stadium."
Her shoes click across the hardwood. She rounds the corner into the bedroom.
Stops.
I can feel her presence without looking up.
"Witt..."
Her eyes travel across the bed.
Across the floor.
Across the dozens, possibly hundreds, of papers surrounding me.
"What are you doing?"
I slowly stand. One letter remains in my hand. My pulse pounding against my ribs.
Not from fear—from possibility.
My eyes meet hers.
"Rune."
Everything stops.
She doesn't move.
She doesn't respond.
The name hangs between us.
I've never spoken it aloud before.
Not once.
Neither of us ever have.
Voice changers.
Encrypted messages.
Anonymous usernames.
Ten years.
And now I use the one word I’ve kept in my heart until Maci came into my life.
One word.
Rune.
I watch confusion ripple across her face before something softer settles in.
Her lips part.
The name sounds different now—warmer, beautiful. More beautiful than it ever looked typed across a computer screen.
I swallow. "When did you know?"
Her eyebrows knit together. "Know what?"
Every muscle in my body stills.
She doesn't know.
She truly doesn’t know.
I lower my gaze to the letter in my hand and begin reading.
Dear Glitch,
Today I failed the same level seven times.
Seven.
I almost convinced myself I was terrible at the game.
Then I realized something.
Failure isn't bad.
It's just data.
It tells you what to do next... and what not to repeat.
Games don't punish us for failing.
They teach us how they were meant to be played.
Maybe people are the same.
—Rune
When I look up, tears fill her eyes.
"How... you...?" The words barely leave her lips. "You're my...?"
"Pen pal." My voice catches. "Code breaker. Gaming partner."
I take one slow step toward her, afraid that if I move too quickly this moment will disappear like a dream.
Her eyes search mine with the same curiosity they always have, only now I understand why they always felt familiar.
I'd spent ten years imagining the girl behind the letters, giving her a hundred different faces.
Somehow, none of them ever came close to the woman standing in front of me.
She lets out a shaky breath.
"You're… Glitch."
Hearing my username on her lips without a voice changer between us nearly brings me to my knees.
"So many times..." I whisper, unable to stop staring at her. "I wondered what your voice really sounded like when you weren't hiding behind a computer."
My hand lifts almost on its own, brushing a strand of pink hair behind her ear before settling against her cheek.
"It was you."
Not a question.
Not a theory.
A fact.
I smile through tears I'd forgotten were falling.
"It was always you."
She leans into my palm, her eyes closing for the briefest second. "I wrote that."
"You did."
"I..." Her hand flies to her mouth. "I forgot about that letter."
"I didn't."
She looks around the room.
"You kept all of them?"
"Every one."
"For ten years?"
I nod, wiping a tear running down her cheek.
"I thought..." She laughs softly through it. "I never imagined..."
She gestures helplessly toward the bed.
"This."
"I searched for you."
Her eyes snap to mine.
"I thought it would be easy, confident of my hacking abilities. But we made it impossible to find each other. It was safer that way. But after a decade I knew you were meant to be in my life then you… you disappeared."
"I know. I had to." She wipes another tear away.
"I had to live in the real world. Even though I didn’t want to be in the real world without you. I needed to look into someone’s eyes and hold their hand. Wanted someone to lay on the couch and watch baking shows with.” She shakes her head. "I thought silence was safer for my heart."
"It wasn't."
"No." A sad smile touches her lips. "It wasn't."
I glance down at the letters surrounding us.
Every hope.
Every fear.
Every dream.
Already shared. Years before we'd ever meet in person.
"I've spent ten years wondering who you were.” Her fingers slide into mine.
"Same." I laugh quietly. "I thought I lost you, but then the real you came into my life. Instantly, I felt connected to Maci Hart in a way I’ve never been connected to anyone except Rune. I knew I had to let Rune go so I could be with Maci. And when I got Rune’s …
your letter, I knew she needed to move on too. "
Her hands slide up my arms and around my neck, smiling through tears. “We were too smart for our own good back then.”
“Still I managed to fall in love with you all over again.” I whisper over her lips. “It’s always been you.”
I dot the corners of her mouth with kisses and then our lips overlap in complete rhythm.
I rest my forehead against hers, tracing the curve of her lips with my thumb. “I love you, Maci Hart.”
Who knew that the girl I'd known for a decade, through hidden letters and secret codes would be the same woman that stole my heart the minute she walked through the office doors.