Prologue
Sawyer
I’m about to die along with my boyfriend, and I’m only thinking about his brother.
The irony of it isn’t lost on me. It lingers in my psyche, even as the world tilts and metal screams and someone’s terror slices through the humid air like a knife.
My boyfriend is behind me, strapped in beside some stranger because of a choice I made. His brother sits next to me instead, our bodies melded together in these last moments.
The one person I spent years trying not to want. The one I could never choose.
And now we’re all about to die, and my last thought in these final seconds is that I’m not reaching for him. I’m not screaming his name.
Some fucked up part of me knows I deserve this ending.
I can’t help but wonder if it was all for nothing. The joy, the pain, the longing. All of it.
But that’s the thing nobody tells you. The unthinkable can happen in the space between heartbeats. In the seconds between breaths. Life doesn’t wait for you to figure it out first.
Take it from me. I should know.
Chapter 1
Sawyer
Owen swears today is going to be perfect. I wish I could believe him.
He’s already up, humming in the kitchen, and the smell of something burning drifts through the cottage. Heart-shaped pancakes again, probably. Raw in the middle but charred around the edges. His specialty.
Maybe he’s right. Maybe today will be a good one.
I head into the kitchen, trying to avoid the one creaky square of linoleum, and find him exactly where I expected, standing in front of the stove with a look of pure determination. He always tries his best, despite being a terrible cook. That’s my Owen, though. Always trying, always hopeful, always so sure that effort can fix anything. That and one of his bright smiles.
We’ve been at the summer cottage for three days already, and he’s made the same burned pancakes every morning. Our rental is smaller than the types of vacation homes Owen grew up in. The type of home his parents still own. The type of home that we all used to share every summer.
Every time I stub my toe on a cluttered corner, or wait too long for the hot water to kick in, or stare at a spot of chipped paint on the kitchen cabinet, I remember it’s my fault we’re notstaying in something nicer. It’s my fault we’re not all together. That I’m the compromise no one wanted to accept. Especially Knox.
It’s strange how quickly situations can change. How a life that felt more permanent than the ground beneath my feet could shatter and leave me picking up pieces that don’t fit together anymore.
Because it wasn’t always this way. Once upon a time, it had been the three of us. Me, Knox, and Owen. Even when their older half sister came around over the summers, she never truly fit in. We were something separate, something complete.
Owen slides my plate across the kitchen island, that perfect smile spreading across his face. The same one that had gotten him elected student body president, chosen for homecoming king, picked for everything good that ever happened in our orbit. “Come on, Sunny. You’re going to love it. The whole family together, just like old times.”
The nickname makes me smile. He’s called me Sunny since we were seven, and I covered my arms with an entire sheet of cartoon sun temporary tattoos. It probably had something to do with my outlook back then too, smiley and upbeat. Always sunny. Or at least when I was with Owen.
I stare down at the misshapen hearts on my plate, syrup pooling in the sunken doughy middle. “Just like old times,” I echo, reaching for my fork.
“Hey.” His warm hand finds mine, as reassuring as his voice. “My parents haven’t been easy…and I don’t blame you for being nervous. But I promise, it’s going to be a good day. I feel it.”
I want to smile back. To embrace the unwavering optimism that Owen always seems to carry. It’s one of the many reasons I love him. He has this boyish charm, this unshakeable belief that the world will bend to match his level of enthusiasm if he just smiles hard enough.
He’s been that way since we were kids, like it’s somehow innate. Owen was the one who lifted me back to my feet when I fell off my pony for the first time, checking me for scrapes and bruises with gentle hands while I cried into his shoulder. He was the one who always knew what to say when I bombed a test, or didn’t get the part I auditioned for in the school play. “It’ll be okay, Sunny. You’ve got the next one.”
Knox was different. Knox was the one standing at the edge of the high dive pool one summer, hands on his hips, calling up to where I clung to the ladder. “What are you? Scared? Come on, Thorne. What are you afraid of? That you’ll break your neck?” His laugh echoed off the water, full of challenge. “You’re not going to die. And if you do, at least it’ll be an interesting way to go.”
While Owen would have told me it was okay to climb back down, that there was no pressure, Knox made me want to prove him wrong. He made me want to show him I wasn’t scared, even when I was terrified. It was Knox hollering my name from below when I finally stood at the edge, Knox clapping and whooping when I closed my eyes and took the leap.
And it was Knox who said, “I knew you had it in you,” afterwards, like me quitting was never a thought in his mind. Like my fear never mattered.
