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I dropped onto the middle cushion, which swallowed me in emerald velvet that had no interest in letting anyone leave before they'd dealt with their feelings. Mia settled beside me. Someone, and it had to have been Mia, because she was the only person who understood the exact restorative power of this, had put tacos on the coffee table. A real spread. Carnitas, roasted vegetables, little cups of salsa verde and crema arranged with more care than my emotional state warranted.

"I love you both," I announced, reaching for a taco even though I'd just eaten dinner. To be fair, it had been expensive, and expensive dinners are rarely filling.

"We know," Mia said. "Tell us about the date."

So I did. All of it. Elyse's good questions and her genuine laugh, and the moment basketball came up, and the cognitive collapse that followed. The parking lot. The honest conversation. The hug goodbye that was perfectly kind and meant absolutely nothing.

I didn't tell them about the street. Not yet. I didn't trust my voice with that.

"She was great," I finished, through a mouthful of carnitas. "Like, seriously wonderful. Out, funny, smart, attractive. All I should want."

"But?" Laine said.

"But I spent forty-five minutes at dinner thinking about Cam's hands." I said it flatly, pretending not to be ashamed, even though I was. "Which is a new personal low, and I've had some personal lows."

Laine turned her wine glass slowly between her fingers. She had that look, the one that meant she'd been sitting with a thought and had decided the time for sitting was over.

"You know what the real tragedy is?" she said quietly. "I think Cam is genuinely in love with you. I've seen the way she looks at you. Like you're the sun, and she's been living in the dark so long she forgot it was an option."

I stared at my taco.

My heart hurt so fucking much.

"Then why won't she just..."

"Because she's terrified." Laine said it simply, without judgment, without drama. "And I understand it in a way I wish I didn't. When my past was exposed, when Henry did what he did, it nearly destroyed me. And that happened to me. I didn't choose it." She paused. "The idea of choosing that kind of exposure on purpose, walking toward it before you're ready, with no control over how it lands?" She shook her head, barely. "I understand why it paralyzes her. Even knowing what it's costing her."

I thought about that. About Cam's Instagram, the thousands of comments from people who loved a version of her that wasn't quite whole. About what it would feel like to have built a life that big, that public, and know that the moment you told the full truth, you'd be handing it over to other people's reactions.

I understood it. I understood it better every time I thought about it, which was becoming a problem, because every time I understood it better, it got harder to stay angry and easier to just miss her.

"I drove past her house," I said.

Mia went still beside me.

"On the way here. I didn't mean to. I took a wrong turn, and I was right there, and there was one light on in her kitchen." My voice thinned out. "Just one. She just made the Finals, and she was home alone in the dark with one light on, and I slowed down. I almost stopped. I almost pulled into her driveway, Laine."

"But you didn't," Laine said.

"No." I wiped my face with the back of my hand, furious at the tears for showing up again. "Because if I'd knocked, she would've let me in. And then I'd be right back where I started. Loving someone in the dark. And I already lived that reality. I already have done my hiding. I did it for twenty-six years. I'm not going back."

Mia's hand found mine and held on.

"So what do I do?" I asked.

Laine looked at me steadily. "You already know."

"Humor me. I'm having a night."

"You hold your boundary. You don't compromise what you need just to make the waiting easier." There was the briefest pause. "And if she loves you enough, she'll find the courage, and she'll come to you. And if she doesn't..." She held my gaze. "Then eventually, you'll heal. Not quickly. Not without it hurting like hell first. But you will."

"That's a terrible answer," I said.

"I know."

"You're very wise, and I resent it deeply."

The corner of Laine's mouth curved. "I know that too."