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Movement makes me blink, and I’m so far down the rabbit-hole of my thoughts that the first shock of dark hair appearing around one of the bigger trees by the bank has my mouth forming the familiar, yet no longer so familiar, name on my lips.
Daisy.
I don’t say it, and it’s a good thing. Instead, my lips press flat as Phoenix stares at me, his gaze distant and cold.
“I didn’t know you came here anymore,” I say finally, before the silence grows too heavy for either of us to break. He looks as uncomfortable as me, though at least he’s dressed in two hoodies instead of just one like my dumbass. I shiver in envy, and that at least makes him look at me.
“I didn’t know you did, either.” Our standoff continues, though today I can’t meet his eyes, just the tip of his nose. The only sound is the rush of water and the far-off call of birds saying their farewells for the day. At best, we have an hour of daylight left, though I’d lean more towards forty-five minutes.
He’s the next to break the silence, though he doesn’t speak. He walks over to me, sneakers crunching over dying leaves as he stares me down.
The crack of a small stick under his foot makes me jump, but his hand is on my shoulder a moment later to calm me, the softshhhthat leaves his lips the cherry on top.
Fuck.Fuck.If anything can bring back my attraction to him, this is it by a landslide.
“I didn’t mean to scare you,” he murmurs in the quiet, broken only by natural sounds. “Not this time.” A small smile hooks at the corner of his mouth and I snort, looking away. “What are you doing here?”
His hand falls from my shoulder, and I turn back to survey the semi-changed riverbank. “They let this shit grow, huh?” I mutter, making the decision to step off of the comfort zone of the path and into the taller, lusher grass. I make my way past the stump that we’d used as a table or a platform. The flatter ground near a jutting, flat rock is familiar, if overgrown. But the areas we’d used for our more fantastical games, the ones Phoenix normally got roped into playing adragonfor, are so grown up with briars that it would take a month to fix it up again.
It hurts more than it should, for reasons I refuse to name. Just as I refuse to name the feeling in my chest when I’d admitted just hownot sorryI am for Emily and Jack.
“Do you remember?” I ask recklessly, pivoting to look at Phoenix. “Back when we were kids, and we’d always make you be the dragon for us to fight?”
He doesn’t answer for long enough that I’m sure I’ve fucked up. My lips part, and I’m ready to apologize, when he says, at last, “That’s not quite how I remember it, Bailey. In fact, I remember youconstantlyvolunteering to be the princess who the dragon kidnaps, and telling Daisy she had to go through all these tests and puzzles just to find you.”
I can feel the heat creeping up my cheeks at his words. Mostly because he’s right, and I’m definitely mortified that he remembers. “Yeah, umm. Well, you know,” I laugh, trying to sound like I’m not regretting everything I’d said a second ago. “I just really…loved dragons as a kid. Loved all reptiles.”
“You were afraid of snakes.”
“Well, yeah, but—”
“You made me pick up a frog from the flat rock because it looked at you funny. I had to toss it in the river before you were satisfied.”
“You’re looking at me funny,” I counter, my embarrassment causing me to snap. “Does that mean you’ll throw yourself in the river for me?”
He cocks his head just a little, and I hate the cute, coy expression it brings over him. It’s unfair for him to still be this damn attractive and for me to still bethisinto him.
Fuck.
“I don’t think so. Ask me again in the summer when it’s warmer,” he hums. “I hear it’s pretty bad to swim in this week.”
“Oh, yeah?” I ask with an incredulous laugh, already looking away and starting to create distance between us. “Who the hell went swimming in it and told youthat?”
“Emily.”
There’s no way he’s just said that. His face doesn’t change. The almost amused look is still there as I try to filter the word through my brain, and the audacity of his casual attitude.
“You can’t. You can't make jokes like that,” I murmur, and turn without thinking to walk away from him. It isn’t that I feel bad for her. Obviously, it’s never been about that. But he can’t say things like that without my brain going back to the idea of him being the damn killer.
Even if it’s not scientifically possible.
“Why? Did I hurt your feelings?” His words aren’t as gentle as they had been, and he follows me as I march up the hill, no longer staying anywhere near the sidewalk.
“Of course you didn’t,” I hiss, barely glancing back at him. Sure enough, he’s still behind me, and I definitely can’t help how jealous I am of how warm he looks. “Why would either of their deaths hurt my feelings?” I don’t know why I’m still walking, except to get away from him.
Not that he’s going to let me, apparently. He follows me no matter how fast I walk, his longer strides preventing any distance from growing between us.
“You’re acting like they bothered you. You’re acting likeIbother you,” Phoenix amends quietly. “Last time I checked, Bailey, this wasn’t how you treated me.”
