Chapter 2

Ollie's POV

A rainy Friday in October always did something to me.

It wasn’t just the boredom it was the way Boston felt too tight. Too loud even when it was quiet. Like the buildings pressed in closer when the sky turned gray, like they didn’t understand what it meant to have space.

I stared at the ceiling from my bed, rain tapping against the window in a steady rhythm. Back home, that sound would’ve meant forest ground turning soft underfoot, pine needles darkening, the air thick with earth and movement.

Here, it just meant I was stuck inside four walls wishing I wasn’t.

I exhaled slowly, rolling onto my side.

Vermont kept pulling at me lately. The pack. The runs through the trees where everything made sense no pretending, no people, no city smell clinging to everything. Just instinct and speed and something ancient in my bones settling into place.

Shane always said I got worse this time of year. Restless. Distracted.

He wasn’t wrong.

A knock hit my bedroom door before it swung open without waiting for permission.

“Bar in twenty. Get ready,” Luca said.

I didn’t even have to look at him to hear the grin in his voice. That same reckless spark he always got when he was bored and looking for trouble.

I finally sat up, rubbing a hand down my face. “It’s pouring.”

“Yeah,” Luca said, like that was the point.

Behind him, Adrian leaned against the doorframe, arms crossed, looking far too composed for someone who clearly had zero intention of staying in tonight. Shane stood a step back, already pulling on his jacket like this had been decided before I even knew there was a decision.

Adrian nodded toward me. “You’ve been sulking for two days straight.”

“I have not been—”

“You have,” Shane cut in flatly.

Luca smirked. “So. Bar. Twenty minutes. You’re coming.”

I stared at them for a second longer, rain still drumming against the glass like it was trying to talk me out of it.

Part of me wanted to stay here. Quiet. Easy. Alone with my thoughts and the pull of home I couldn’t quite scratch.

But the other part, the louder part, the one that always won when it came to them was already standing.

“Fine,” I said finally, grabbing my hoodie off the chair.

Luca clapped once like I’d just agreed to something far more important than a night out. “Good lad.”

Shane shook his head as he walked out. “This is going to be a mistake.”

Adrian followed, tossing over his shoulder, “Most fun things usually are.”

I pulled my hoodie on, glancing out the window one more time as the rain blurred the city lights into streaks.

We got to the bar far too early for my liking, but with these guys there’s no such thing as “too early” anyway. With Luca, Shane, and Adrian, the night doesn’t start when people arrive, it starts the second they decide it does.

Within an hour, the place was already loud enough to feel like a full crowd, Luca and Adrian disappearing into the shifting mass like they were on a mission. Which, knowing them, they probably were.

Shane stayed back with me near the bar.

“Let them run off,” he said, watching Luca lean into a group of girls like he was auditioning for something. “They’ll circle back when they get bored.”

I took a slow sip of my drink, leaning an elbow on the counter. “They don’t get bored.”

Shane snorted. “True. They just reset.”

The music was too loud, the lighting too warm, everything just slightly out of sync in that way bars always are. People laughing too hard, talking too close, pretending the night meant more than it did.

I was halfway through zoning out again when I stood up.

“I’m gonna go take a wizz,” I said, already turning.

Shane didn’t even bother responding. “Don’t start a fight.”

“No promises,” I tossed over my shoulder.

The bathroom was cramped, too bright, and smelled like cheap cleaner trying to cover up a hundred other nights. I was in and out quick, shaking off the noise as I pushed the door open again.

That’s when I heard it.

Karaoke.

Off-key. Loud. Completely unbothered.

I paused halfway back toward Shane.

Two girls were up on the tiny stage area, absolutely destroying an early 2000s breakup song like it was their personal anthem. One of them was practically dancing more than singing, the other laughing so hard she kept missing half the words.

It was chaotic and was kind of impossible not to watch.

“How long have they been up there?” I asked as I reached Shane again.

He didn’t look away from them. “Too long.”

A beat.

Then he added, amused, “But they’re having the time of their lives, so no one’s had the heart to stop them.”

I let out a quiet huff of a laugh, leaning back against the bar.

The girls finished their song with a dramatic final note that absolutely did not land anywhere near correct, and the crowd still cheered like they’d just won something.

They sprinted off the stage afterward, breathless, laughing, collapsing back into their group of friends like they’d survived war.

And that’s when it happened.

One of them turned.

Just for a second.

Long enough for me to see her properly.

Long enough for the noise of the bar to dull at the edges like someone had pressed a hand over it.

My chest gave a strange, sudden hitch, sharp enough that I stopped breathing for half a beat.

I didn’t even have a name for it.

Just awareness.

Immediate. Irrational. Pulling.

My eyes stayed on her a second too long as she disappeared back into her friends, still laughing, still glowing with that unfiltered kind of happiness that didn’t belong in a place like this.

Shane said something beside me, but I didn’t catch it.

Because whatever that feeling was

It wasn’t gone.