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Taking a big breath of summer air, we stepped away from the front door of the bar toward the closed shop next door.

“What’s going on with you, Lena?”

He’d let go of my wrist, but my heart hadn’t gotten the memo. It was pumping so fast, I couldn’t think. This was Nolan. My best friend. Someone I loved more than almost anyone in the world.

Just say it.

I wanted him to kiss me. That fact was coupled with another more sobering one. If I answered his question honestly, he would march me to the hospital and have my head checked.

Could I take him with me? If we read the book together, would we both transport? How did that work? And did I want to risk it, putting Nolan in danger? If something happened to him, I’d never forgive myself.

Better idea.

I’d go back, just one more time, and get proof. Bring something back with me so that when I told Nolan what was happening, he wouldn’t think I was looney tunes.

“I can’t tell you,” I said. “Yet. First, I have to⁠—”

“Are you kidding me right now?”

I could count on one hand the number of times I’d seen Nolan angry. It just wasn’t his thing. At least, not like this. He wasn’t just mad.

Nolan was pissed.

“Do you know how many years I waited for this? Hoped, dreamed, someday you might see me the same way I see you? Date other women who never measured up? Every woman I dated was a placeholder. I kept hoping if I moved on, maybe you would too … toward me. Lisa was the last straw. When I realized our friendship bothered her, I was done. I'd already chosen the woman I wanted, years ago. Worse, watch you date guys I knew would never love you the same way I could. I’ve waited a lifetime for what happened in that bar,” he flung his hand toward Boots & Brews. “For you to finally see me. And now that it’s happened, you’re still hiding from me?”

His voice was low, but the crack in it hurt worse than if he’d shouted. Nolan’s jaw tightened, the muscle in his cheek twitching. “Do you have any idea what that does to me, Lena?”

“Nolan, I⁠—”

He stepped back, shaking his head. “Don’t. Whatever this is, whatever you’re not saying, keep it.”

The distance between us felt impossible, a gulf I’d created. I hadn’t meant to open the door and immediately, thoroughly, shut it.”

Tell him. Without proof. Don’t go back. Say it.

“I can’t keep waiting for you to let me in.”

I traveled to another time. Or dimension. Or something. But I don't know what, exactly.

The words sounded crazy, even in my brain. Even to me.

He turned, walked into the night, until he got smaller, and smaller, and I couldn’t see him anymore.

And just like that, the steadiest thing in my life—the one man who’d always stayed—was gone.