CHAPTER 9: I Try

°❀⋆.ೃ࿔*:･

By the time I finally dragged myself out of bed, washed my face, and forced something resembling an outfit on, my nerves were already on edge.

The house felt unnervingly quiet as I headed downstairs, every step echoing a little too loudly. I kept expecting to run into Mr. Gage in one of the hallways, but each one was empty, as if the whole place were holding its breath.

Halfway to the front door, my phone buzzed. It was a message from Noah: “Outside.”

I swallowed and stepped outside, the sunlight pouring over me.

Its brightness felt almost mocking while laughter floated from the car by the driveway, and my stomach sank at the sight of how many people were already crammed inside

The front passenger door sat open, and in the seat I’d always assumed was mine was a girl I didn’t recognize—pretty, with warm skin, glossy lips, and hair styled perfectly for a casual outing.

For a heartbeat, I froze. A month ago, maybe even a week ago, I would’ve walked right up, forced a teasing smile, and said, That’s My Seat, half-joking, half-serious, fully expecting Noah to laugh and ask her to move. But today, I didn’t have the energy. Or the right. Or… anything, really.

So I quietly opened the back door and slid in without a word.

A beat of silence followed, just long enough to pull Noah’s attention from whatever pointless joke he was laughing about. He twisted in his seat, eyebrows raised, clearly surprised.

“Oh...” he exhaled slowly, blinking at me through the rearview mirror. “I, uh… thought you’d be mad.”

If you knew that, why did you let her have the seat?

I didn’t say it, but it pulsed through my skull so loudly I was convinced someone would hear it.

Instead I forced a small smile, thin as tissue paper. “It’s fine.”

The girl in the passenger seat whipped around immediately, hands flying up as if she’d been accused of something terrible.

“Oh my God… no, no, no, I swear I didn’t know! Noah just told me to hop in and I didn’t realize you usually sit here. Oh my God, I feel so bad! Please don’t be upse…”

“No, really,” I cut in, keeping my voice light. “It’s okay. Sit.”

She kept apologizing, but I tuned out. My attention drifted instead to the couple beside me which was a girl with thick lashes leaning into her boyfriend’s arm.

She nudged me lightly with her elbow.

“Damn, you’re chill,” she said with a grin. “If some girl took the front seat from me, I’d riot.”

Her boyfriend snorted. “I wouldn’t let anyone sit there even by accident. I value my life.”

Everyone laughed.

I smiled because I was supposed to.

Because Thea—the good Thea—was always smiling.

“Yeah, babe would murder me,” the guy added, kissing his girlfriend’s cheek dramatically.

“I would,” she agreed proudly. “I’d drag him out of the car by his ear.”

Again, everyone laughed.

Again, I smiled.

Then she glanced at me with a teasing look. “But you… you’re so calm compared to me. You’re like… the opposite of crazy.”

My smile twitched.

“She really is,” Noah chimed in easily. “Thea’s never like that.”

I waited for the rest of the sentence.

Sometimes he’d say Thea’s Reasonable or Thea Doesn’t Get Jealous Over Dumb Stuff.

But instead, he added, laughing lightly, “Unless she’s in one of her moods.”

The car filled with laughter, but I stayed quiet. I already knew the script—I'd learned it a long time ago. If I didn’t speak my mind, didn’t react, didn’t defend myself, then I was the sweet one. The calm one. The easygoing one.

But if I did—if I dared to say how I felt—suddenly I was the dramatic one. The emotional one. The girl who “took everything too seriously,” who “couldn’t handle a joke.”

It had always been like this.

Always.

So I stayed quiet in that back seat, staring out the window as the road blurred by. I watched sunlight flicker through the passing trees, watched the city shifting into neighborhoods, watched the whole world moving while I stayed trapped in a version of myself that everyone preferred.

“Seriously though,” the girl in the front said, turning halfway in her seat, “you’re like… insanely levelheaded. I respect that.”.

“I try,” I murmured with a smile.

Noah looked at me through the rearview mirror, his eyes flicking up to catch my expression for a brief second. Then shrugged and looked away.

I rested my forehead against the window, letting the glass cool my skin. The hum of the car vibrated through me, grounding me just enough to stay present.