Page 41 of All the way home

It doesn’t.

“Yeah.” Kieran waves a hand, all casual. “It was a grad gift.”

Zach’s mouth drops open. He snaps it shut just as quickly. His graduation gift had been a telescope, secondhand.

And honestly, thinking about it, he likes that a whole lot better than he would’ve liked a forty-five-hour trip. Being stuck in this airport is already harrowing enough, and he hasn’t even set foot on the plane yet.

“Some grad gift.”

“My parents have always been a bit extra,” Kieran says, expression long-suffering.

“And that doesn’t run in the family at all,” Zach notes dryly.

To his surprise, Kieran throws his head back and laughs aloud, bright and startled, grinning wide. “Not even a little.”

Zach holds his gaze until he can’t, the echoes of Kieran’s smile etched into his own face.

Okay, he thinks, okay. Being stuck in this airport has been harrowing, yes.

But maybe it’s not so bad.

Hour Four-2:01 P.M. Chapter Thirteen

Rena

It’s not that Rena ever intended to keep secrets.

Dazed, she walks back to the gate, book tucked under one arm, the sleeve of her sweatshirt wrapped around her other hand so the Aero bar won’t melt.

“Here.” She holds it out as Lucas lifts his bag off her seat.

He takes it with a perplexed smile, tucking it into his pocket. “Thanks. New book?”

Rena has it open before she’s even sitting, nodding in answer, feeling a thousand miles from her body. She stares at the first page, unseeing.

In hindsight, if she’d had a moment to think about it, she would have told Lucas everything. It was just that her life had flipped upside down so abruptly that she hadn’t been thinking straight, and she’d needed to be there—needed to be home. She hadn’t meant to withhold the truth or lock him out. Honestly, she hadn’t even realized she’d done it until he brought it up, months later.

Hypocrite.

The idea burns.

Of course, Lucas had turned up the next day anyway, because she hadn’t told him. Her phone was a useless brick, dead for only God knew how long, and after it had been twenty-four hours, he’d turned up at the house.

Mum let him in. Rena remembers standing on the stairs, blinking, not processing, for a long time. The sight of Lucas made her feel sick, but it wasn’t his fault. How could it be his fault that the world went on even after it stopped making sense?

“Rena, what is going on?” His voice quivered.

The whole world snapped into a violent crush of sound. The rumble of the furnace, the whoosh of air in the vents. The heat blowing against her lips didn’t feel real. Her swollen eyes were stiff and still hot from crying.

“Are you—oh.” Lucas took the stairs two at a time and yanked her into a hug. “Oh, Rena.”

She didn’t want a hug. She didn’t want to be touched, she wanted to throw him off. But he was holding on to her so tightly that eventually she gave up, collapsing against his shoulder, sobs shaking her whole frame.

Lucas was—and still is—one of the only people in Rena’s life who’d seen her cry, and every time it felt like the end of the world. She hates when overwhelm rips through her, sprouting between her ribs like ivy, choking until her eyes burned and there’s nothing she can do to stop the tears from spilling.

“He didn’t tell me,” she gasped, desperate for air, for the ache to stop. “I didn’t know, he didn’t say, I—”

“Rena.” Lucas prods her arm, wrenching her back to the present.