Chapter One

I would remember, later, that the knock came three times. Not two. Not one long one. Three short, careless knocks, like whoever stood on the other side had no idea they were about to end something.

I was still catching my breath when I heard it. My back was against the wall of a dorm room that wasn't mine, my shoes still on, my phone somewhere in the tangle of sheets. Rhydian went still beside me so fast it was like someone had switched him off.

"That's him," I whispered.

"I know."

Neither of us moved. My heart was doing something violent and stupid against my ribs, and for one absurd second all I could think was: I am going to lose everything in the next ten seconds. Not because of what we'd done. Because of what it would look like. Because of who was on the other side of that door.

Rhydian reached over, very slowly, and laced his fingers through mine. He didn't say it would be fine. He never made promises he couldn't keep. He just held on, like that alone might be enough to keep the room from tilting.

The knock came again. Louder this time.

But that night was still months away from me. I didn't know yet what it would cost, or who I'd become by the time I got there. That morning — the one that actually starts this story — I didn't even know Rhydian's last name.

• • •

That morning, I was already forty minutes behind my own life.

I crossed the quad with my laptop bag slamming against my hip, one thumb typing an apology to my shift manager, the other hand holding my phone up to my ear like that would somehow make the hospital call connect faster. A nurse's voice cut through the static.

"Ms. Aderyn? Your father's morning labs came back. Dr. Rook wants to adjust his medication schedule. We just need a callback when you can."

"I can call at noon," I said, already knowing I wouldn't have a real break at noon. "Is he — is he in pain?"

"He's stable. Comfortable."

Comfortable was the word they used when they didn't want to scare me. I'd learned that months ago.

I hung up and immediately my phone buzzed again — my manager, short and clipped: Second warning about lateness this month. We need to talk.

I didn't have time to feel that yet. I shoved the phone into my coat pocket and kept walking, already rehearsing the excuse I'd give, already calculating how much of my paycheck I could afford to lose if they cut my hours.

Then it rang again.

Valerian.

I answered before I'd even finished the thought that I probably shouldn't have.

"Hey," I said, and my voice came out lighter than I felt, softer than I meant it to. That was the strange thing about him — no matter what else was falling apart in my hands, some part of me still reorganized itself around his voice.

"Where are you?" he said. "I've been waiting."

"I'm coming, I just got out of —"

"It's fine. Just hurry."

He hung up before I could finish the sentence. I stood there for half a second, phone still against my ear, static where his voice had been, and told myself it didn't mean anything. He was probably just distracted. He had a lot going on too.

I didn't ask myself why I was the one apologizing.

• • •

By the time I reached the café near the west gate, he was already at our usual table, and the moment he saw me his whole face changed — like someone had lit something behind his eyes just for me. He stood, pulled out my chair, pressed a kiss to my temple in front of everyone.

"There she is," he said, loud enough for the table beside us to hear. A girl I didn't know actually smiled at the two of us like we were something worth smiling at.

"Sorry I'm late, I had to —"

"Don't worry about it." He said it warmly. Publicly. His arm slid around the back of my chair, casual and possessive at once, the kind of gesture that made other girls glance over with something between envy and curiosity.

I let myself sink into it. For one full minute, I let myself believe the day was going to be fine.

Then the waiter left, and his voice dropped into something flatter, quieter, meant only for me.

"You look tired," he said. Not gently. "Did you even try this morning?"

"I've been up since five, Val, I had a shift and then the hospital called and —"

"It's always something with you." He rubbed a hand over his face like I was the exhausting part of his day. "I just wanted one morning where you weren't falling apart before ten a.m."

I felt my face go hot. Around us the café clattered on, oblivious. I looked down at the napkin in my lap and thought, stupidly, maybe I really am asking too much from him. Maybe if I managed my life better, planned better, needed less, none of this would happen. It didn't occur to me — not then — that a person who loved me wouldn't need me to manage my exhaustion so he wouldn't have to see it.

"I'm sorry," I said.

He softened instantly, like flipping a switch. "Hey. I'm not mad." He took my hand across the table, thumb brushing my knuckles, and just like that the warmth came back into his voice, into his face, and I let the apology I'd just made undo the ten seconds of quiet cruelty that came before it.

That was how it always went. I just hadn't learned to notice the pattern yet.

• • •

Neriah found me an hour later outside the lecture hall, arms crossed, watching me with the particular expression she reserved for when she'd seen something she didn't like.

"You okay?" she asked.

"Fine. Just tired."

"You always look like that after breakfast with him." She said it lightly, not accusing, just true. "You know you don't always have to explain yourself to him, right? Being late isn't a crime."

"He wasn't mad," I said, too quickly.

She didn't push it. That was the thing about Neriah — she knew when pushing would just make me hold on tighter. She bumped my shoulder with hers instead and let it go, and I was grateful, and I hated a little that I needed her to let it go.

• • •

I met Rhydian for the first time properly that afternoon, though I'd seen him around before — Valerian's roommate, quiet in a way that felt less like shyness and more like he was choosing what to notice. We were in the same study group, three of us at a table littered with someone else's abandoned coffee cups, and I must have checked my phone four times in ten minutes.

"Everything okay?" he asked. He wasn't looking at me when he said it, like he wanted to give me room to lie if I needed to.

"Yeah. Just waiting on a call."

He nodded and went back to his notes. He didn't ask again. But something about the way he'd asked — plain, unhurried, no performance in it — stayed with me longer than it should have.

At one point he slid his charger across the table without a word, because he'd noticed my phone blinking red before I had. I thanked him. He shrugged like it was nothing, like noticing things wasn't a decision he made on purpose. I didn't think about it again until much later, when I understood that with Rhydian, it never was a decision. He simply saw what was in front of him.

• • •

Valerian texted at six: Something came up. Meet me at the garden lounge behind the arts building instead.

I didn't think anything of it. I gathered my things, told Neriah I'd catch her later, and crossed campus in the dark with the wind cutting through my jacket, already composing the version of my day I'd tell him — the parts that would make him proud of me, not the parts that would make him tired of me.

The garden lounge was quieter than the main café, tucked behind a hedge, lit by strings of amber bulbs that made everything look softer than it was. I didn't see him right away. Then I did.

He was at the corner table, half turned away from the entrance, and Sereia was across from him — except across wasn't the right word. She was close. Her hand rested on his forearm like it belonged there. He was leaning toward her, saying something low enough that I couldn't hear it from the doorway, and she was laughing at whatever it was with her whole face, easy and unguarded in a way I hadn't seen her be with anyone else.

It wasn't a conversation. I understood that in the half second before he noticed me. It was something with a history to it, something practiced, something that didn't belong to a stranger sitting across a table.

I don't know how long I stood there. Long enough that the cold stopped registering. Long enough that my phone, still in my hand, buzzed once with a message I didn't look at.

Then he looked up.

His eyes found mine across the lounge, and for one endless second, neither of us moved.