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“What does?”
“You know, love. Eternal happiness with the same person. It just…it’s a nice idea, I just don’t really get it.”
I try to process this. “You do not get it.”
Samantha sighs and rubs her palms against her black leggings. “My dad left us when I was three. I don’t even remember him. And my mom never dated anyone else, so I didn’t exactly have a prime example of a healthy relationship to look up to. I, uh, I grew up, got married because I thought I was in love, but it faded quickly, and now, I don’t know. I guess I see it as something I need proof of to believe in, you know?”
“You are close with Vanessa, though, and you must be able to see how in love she and Axil are.”
“Oh yeah, I’ve seen other people fall in love,” she replies, then grows quiet as she focuses intently on her fingertips. “But it doesn’t happen for everyone.”
I open my mouth to respond to the words she did not say––that even though she clearly does not believe love was meant to find her, it will, but she holds up both hands, stopping me. “Don’t move.”
“Uh,” I begin.
“Nope, don’t look at me,” she instructs while pulling her phone out of the purse at her feet. “Hold your face right where it is and tilt your chin just a little bit to the left.”
Seconds feel like hours as I hold myself still. Now that Sam has told me not to look her way, it is the only thing I want to do.
“Okay, got it,” she eventually says, beaming as she swipes across her screen. “Sorry, the sun was hitting your shoulders and cheekbones perfectly.”
“May I see?”
She walks around my desk and leans over my shoulder to show me, her long curls brushing against my cheek. Her hair smells of peppermint, and the perfume she applied to the pulse point on her neck has faded but is still present. Warm. Intoxicating.
“See the way the light pours in all around you like it’s wrapping you in a hug? Incredible, right?” she asks.
“Incredible,” I repeat in a hoarse voice, my throat suddenly dry. I’m not looking at the pictures, or even in the direction of her phone. My eyes are locked on the end of one of her perfect curls, my fingers twitching with desperation to touch it. “Yes, truly.”
“Ours. Ours. Ours,”my draxilio chants inside my head.
She straightens and grabs her bag off the floor. “Care if I post it?”
“Uh, no,” I reply, still in a daze from her closeness.
“I have to get back home, but I’ll see you tonight?”
“Yes,” I tell her. “I shall arrive at eight to read to your mother.”
She shoots me a smile before the door closes behind her, and it takes several minutes for me to return to reality.
Suddenly, tonight cannot come soon enough.
CHAPTER 5
SAM
It’s pouring rain when Mylo arrives, with thunder cracking through the sky, causing our too-thin windows to vibrate. Yet he still shows up five minutes early. I thought he looked hot in his true form, butdios mío, wet Mylo is also a tasty snack.
Droplets cling to the ends of his dirty blond hair, and as he removes his raincoat and kicks off his shoes, I watch a drop land on his forehead and travel down the side of his face, over the sharpened edge of his cheekbone, and disappear into the dimple next to his mouth. I find myself, for the first time ever, envious of a tiny drop of water.
“Here,” I say, handing him a towel.
He runs it roughly through his hair, then carefully wipes his glasses clean. “Do I look ridiculous?” he asks, his face scrunching up as he surveys the dampness of his clothes.
“Not at all,” I tell him honestly. “You look like a guy who weathered a storm just to read a bedtime story to an old lady.”
“Who are you calling old, Papita?” Mom hollers from her bedroom upstairs.
