Chapter 28
Stella
O ur walk back to camp is peaceful. Adrian’s smiling next to me, and I can’t help stealing peeks at his grin when I know he isn’t looking. He’s so handsome when he smiles.
Of course, that peace shatters when we return to camp.
“. . . Come on, you can’t be serious.” Isabella laughs.
“What, are you scared?” Jay teases.
Adrian tries to hide his chuckle next to me.
I walk over to Hazel, asking in a low voice, “What’s happening?”
Hazel is fighting so hard not to laugh. “Jay is convinced he knows Isa well enough to guess where she would hide in a game of hide-and-seek. The two have been going back and forth for like ten minutes.”
“Of course.” I laugh quietly.
“. . . Are you arrogant enough to think you could find everyone ’s hiding place, huh?” Isa taunts.
Jay laughs. “Not everyone’s. Yours.”
“Then I guess we’ll have to see.”
Adrian’s eyes meet mine, and a smile forms.
One minute, we’re all at camp watching these two bicker, the next we’re all walking with our team to the forest to play along with their games.
It’s stupid, but it’s also fun. It’s a competition that’s lighthearted and silly.
It makes me feel alive, not because of the adrenaline, but because of joy.
Once we’re all settled in, Isabella turns to face us. “We start counting.”
“You’re sure you want to start?” Jay asks. “We could go first to show you how it’s done—”
“One . . . Two . . .” Isa cuts in loudly.
All of us are laughing as we count. Once we reach ninety, we all open our eyes again and go look for the others.
We established that we could use our magic so . . .
Sam’s magic isn’t very useful to hide. Layla’s ability to control water would be useful if we played near the lake, but the area is all trees.
Adrian’s . . . Well, even if a storm was passing by, I know he wouldn’t use his magic to win.
He cares too much about his sisters for that.
Jay is the only one whose magic is tricky.
For all we know, they could all be up in the sky.
Then again, the game is hide-and-seek, not tag.
If he were to use his magic, he’d probably use it to hide up in the—
I halt to a stop when two arms wrap around me. Hazel’s blonde hair drapes over my shoulder.
“Stella, stop. This is a game of whether or not we inflate Isabella and Jay’s egos. Don’t think about it so logically.”
I laugh. “You have a point.”
Just as we start walking again, Layla exclaims, “I was found!”
Nate walks over to us with a small smile. Hazel high-fives him and we all keep looking.
“Where was she hiding?” I ask Nate as I push one of the branches away from my face.
“Next to a tree overlooking the lake.”
Of course.
Hazel looks at me with a small smile. “Nate isn’t the only one of us who doesn’t like competitions.”
“Why does Layla not like them?”
“I don’t know.” Hazel’s smile turns sad. “We’ve all changed a lot in the last few years.”
Nate halts to a stop as he wraps her in a hug. I swear her eyes get teary and my heart cracks.
I stop too, walking over to them to hold and squeeze her hand. She smiles up at me.
She untangles herself from us, wiping her eyes. “Neither of you need to worry about me, okay? Truly, I’m fine. There are just days that hit harder than others.”
We start walking again and the silence is heavy. I think back to all the times I saw Hazel emotional about her relationship with her siblings. While it happened for many reasons, there’s one of her siblings that seems to bring emotions out of her more easily.
Layla.
It shouldn’t surprise me.
Isabella walks over with a proud smile on her face. “I found Sam. We only have two left!”
I grin back at her enthusiasm. “We’re doing great!”
She eyes us. “Have you three been looking around together? We should all go on our own to look. We’ll find them faster.”
I turn quickly to look at Hazel and Nate, trying to read what they want to do.
Nate’s eyes are already zoomed in on Hazel. She looks at both of us with a smile no one would be fooled by. “Great idea, Isa. We should look on our own. I’ll go left.”
Nate jumps in. “I’ll continue straight ahead.”
I look back at Isa whose face screams confusion. “Okay, good. I’ll go right.”
“I’m going to retrace our steps to see if we missed anyone,” I declare.
After that, we all go our separate ways.
I walk quietly, my mind running wild with questions. Should I go back to Hazel? She seemed really sad. But, at the same time, what can I even do? I can’t fix her relationship with her siblings.
A weird twinkle hits my bloodstream, interrupting my thoughts.
Then a scream echoes in the forest. Then another.
I panic and look around for a disaster. I look up to find the trees’ branches all merging together, like the forest’s trees are all uniting as one—
I did this.
A wild grin breaks free at the realization.
I. Did. This.
As if I needed confirmation, neon green butterflies are floating in the air. This isn’t just my magic in the piano room starting to come back to life. This is big. The forest here is huge and I interconnected the branches of every tree together.
I feel like me again. My eyes tear up a little.
“Hey!” a voice calls out from above me.
I practically jump out my skin. I look up to find Jay upside down, his legs stuck in the branches I intertwined.
“How did you get stuck in there?” I ask with a small laugh as I walk closer to the tree.
Jay groans but laughs with me. “I was hiding here and then you made the tree do this weird thing and I lost my balance.”
“At least you didn’t hit your head.”
“Yeah. At least,” he says sarcastically.
I laugh and try to climb the tree. With the state of my magic, I’m not sure I’ll be able to free him unless I can touch the branches with my bare hands. Except that, with all the branches merged together, it’s impossible for me to climb the tree.
I look up at him. “I need to touch the branch to get you out, but I can’t climb. Do you mind—Woah!”
A sudden wind, so strong that it makes me lose my balance and fall, lifts me from the ground and up into the air. It’s almost like solid ground beneath my hands and legs, yet incredibly comfortable, like the feel of a cloud.
Jay’s magic gently deposits me on the branch. My curls are a mess, and my shoes practically flew off. Jay and I are both chuckling as I wrap my hands around the branches, willing my magic to come back to life.
Don’t let me down now, please.
“Hey,” Jay says gently. “There’s a weird butterfly in your hair.”
A smile blossoms on my face. “Good.”
Sparkles of my magic, the glowing butterflies, all surround us as a pulse hits my bloodstream. I focus on it and, when I feel my powers at my fingertips, I push the branches apart to free Jay’s leg.
He celebrates below me as he uses his abilities to land his fall and I laugh. I lie down on the branches, in awe of myself.
I did this. The part of me I thought was gone . . . It’s coming back.
Jay uses his magic to help me back down, and I can’t wipe the grin off my face.
I’m finding the parts of me I thought were lost before coming here, and I can’t help but wonder if I could have done it without these people.
Adrian
I’m the last one remaining.
I didn’t bother trying to climb a tree—it was a futile effort. Still, it seems my simple hiding spot is the best one yet.
A sniffling sound pulls me into high alert. Uncaring about this whole game, I walk out to find the source. My heart breaks when I see her golden hair and colorful clothes. Hazel.
I run to join her, leaning against a rock from the mountain. I sit next to her, and her wild eyes meet mine. I slowly wrap my arm around her shoulder, giving her the time and space to back away if she needs to. I don’t know where to stand with her anymore, and I fully expect her to bolt away.
Instead, for the first time in years, she practically jumps on me to wrap her arms around me, crying. I hold her tighter, my cries almost matching hers.
“What happened?” I ask gently.
“We win, I found you,” she replies with the worst attempt of a laugh I ever heard.
I smile sadly. “Hazel . . .” I murmur, my heart breaking.
“Adrian. I hate seeing you all like this,” she cries.
“Like what?” I ask, my voice cracking.
“Like we just got the news Mom and Dad died. It’s like you’re always reliving that day.”
Her words are a bullet to the chest. I’d always hoped Hazel was too young to perceive everything happening in our home, how hard the grief was hitting us.
But my little sister’s always been emotionally perceptive.
“Grief isn’t easy, Hazel.”
“Healing isn’t either, Adrian.”
My throat closes.
Hazel sighs. “I just wish you all could try to move forward. Yes, grief isn’t easy, but it doesn’t mean you have to stop living. It’s been so long now, Adrian.”
I rub my sister’s back, but I don’t know anymore who I’m soothing. “I know, Hazel. I know.”
I wish I could be a better brother for you. Be the brother you need.
Hazel moves out of my hold when we hear footsteps coming.
Stella and Jay are smiling. “Well, we won,” Stella says softly.
Jay pushes her shoulder playfully, and every emotion I felt seconds ago melts away when I see Stella’s smile. It’s radiant—golden like the sun.
Just like her.
Hazel giggles next to me, and the pressure on my heart eases. Stella has that effect on everyone. Just her smile, her presence, is enough to make the problems we carry less heavy.
She smiles so bright she casts everyone around her in the same glow.
God, she’s magic.
Jay’s eyes have a teasing gleam in them as he joins me. “Come on. Let’s show them how we really play the game.”
Stella and Hazel walk away, still talking animatedly.
Jay laughs. “This is goddamn gold.” He seems thoughtful for a second. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you look at anyone like that.”
“Yeah . . .” I admit quietly. “I’ve never felt like that before either.”
I’d always seen falling in love as a big event. I’ve always loved people deeply, almost obsessively. I always fell in love fast.
But with Stella . . . I fell in love with her just as I fell in love with myself. I discovered parts of me I didn’t know existed before her. She inspired me to want more from life, to grow into who I want to be. She made me fall with myself just as she made me fall for her.
I never realized falling in love could be so simple.
An honest conversation, a hug when you need it, a shared safe space.
Those little moments where we both see each other without needing words, where the world fades away because all that matters is her.
Her smile. Seeing her glow from happiness again.
Having the chance to bask in her life for a few more minutes.
It’s simple yet so, so beautiful.
Jay’s shoulder playfully hits me, a wicked grin on his face. I grin back.
“Let’s go win this.”
I chuckle. “We’re the best team.”
“That’s the spirit!”
When the four of us finish counting, we all start walking to look for the other team. It doesn’t take us long to realize that Sam and Layla are in a deep conversation behind us, barely looking at their surroundings.
Jay’s hand land on my shoulders. “Well, let’s leave these two to their thing and do this together. Both of us. Just like we used to.”
I smile, reminded of all the good times we had together growing up. “Of course. We’ll always be a team.”
Jay grins, and I notice the reassurance slipped in more than he wants to let on. His grip on my shoulders loosens. His voice is stronger, more confident, when he replies, “Hell yeah.”
Jay and I separate. He goes left, near the cliff overlooking the lake, and I go right, where I was hiding before.
The soft cracking of the branches fills the air as I walk and look around. It doesn’t take me long to find Hazel and Nate laughing.
A smile lights up my face. I always loved seeing this side of Hazel.
“Nate!” she hisses between giggles. “Stop. Tickling. Me! You never . . . play fair!”
Nate laughs. “But you said you needed a laugh.”
“I meant it—”
I walk away, leaving those two to their world.
I climb the little path as I get higher up in the mountain. If I hadn’t hidden where I did, I would have never noticed this small area. It’s too well hidden with the trees.
I know I made the right decision when I see a glowing butterfly.
Stella.
I know she’s near, so I look in the trees, behind the rocks . . . Then I hear her laugh. It’s above my head.
I look up, and I can’t help the grin from breaking free. She carved stairs from the mountain and made a huge space, almost like a cabin inside the mountain. I climb in the spots she carved to join her.
When my head reaches her level, I’m amazed. She’s playing with her magic, trying to figure it out. Dozens of green butterflies surround her. Flying around. Some are in her hair, some are holding on to her skin or the rocks.
Her eyes shoot to mine, a slow smile spreading on her face. “You found me.”
I will always find you, Stella. There isn’t a mask you can put on that I won’t see through. There isn’t a lie you can tell that I will believe.
I see you.
I flush under her gaze. She glows like the sun, especially with its light highlighting her curls and dark skin and lime-green eyes . . .
It feels like there is no one else in the world, nothing but Stella and me in this little spot she created.
Her eyes dive back to mine.
My heart rate is out of control.
Laughter erupts from below, a chaotic mess of voices echoing in the forest. I look down to find the others looking for us. The game is over.