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Time trickles by, slow, relentless. I draw in a breath and let it out, trying to sync with the rhythm around me. Yet the fissure widens with each passing second, a chasm between what is and what could be.
The game ends with me beside Xavier, a picture-perfect scene marred by the storm within. My heart beats a fractured cadence, longing for what I can’t have in the light of day.
Levi, Grayson, Conrad—they’re all here with me, even as I sit alone among the crowd.
42
BRIELLE
I’m relaxed on the couch, my gaze shifting between my dad and Levi. Xavier and his parents have gone home, and Dad’s sprawled out in his big chair, a bottle dangling from his fingers. The game is long over, and the TV flashes with garish colors, the volume of the adult animation turned low but still a buzz in the background.
I slip my phone from the pocket of my jeans, the screen lighting up my face in the dim room. The blue glow is a portal away from the heavy air laden with my dad’s snores and the faint sound of lewd jokes from the TV show.
My thumb glides over the glass, an automatic motion. Videos autoplay, a blur of colors and sounds. I pause on a clip of a cat doing something ridiculously cute, and I smile despite myself. It feels good, light, a tiny escape hatch from the weight of the evening.
I scroll further, stopping at posts from people I haven’t seen in years. High school friends, mostly. Lives moved on, caught in the frozen smiles of digital memory. I like a post here, a picture there. It’s a silent nod across time and space—I see you, I remember.
“Hey.” Levi’s voice is a whisper, close.
I jump, my heart thudding against my ribs. I didn’t even hear him approach. He plops down beside me on the couch, our thighs touching. The warmth from his leg seeps through the fabric of my pants, drawing a sharp contrast to the coolness of my phone.
“Your dad’s asleep,” he murmurs, his breath tickling my ear.
I glance over at Dad, and sure enough, his head has lolled to the side, cartoonish snores now competing with the animated antics on screen. A sense of relief washes over me, followed immediately by a prickling awareness of Levi’s proximity.
“Thanks for letting me know,” I say, my voice barely above a whisper, as if louder words might shatter the fragile peace of the moment.
Levi’s hand wraps around my arm, firm, insistent. It pulls me back to reality, away from the digital world I was lost in.
“Wait,” I protest, tugging slightly, but he doesn’t let go. “What are you doing?”
His eyes lock onto mine, intense and unreadable. “We need to talk.” There’s an urgency in his voice that I can’t ignore.
“About what?” I ask, a frown creasing my forehead. Confusion clouds my mind. Why is Levi acting so serious all of a sudden?
“About you,” he says, and then pauses, as if choosing his next words carefully. “And Grayson. And Conrad.”
I freeze. A sliver of ice runs down my spine. This isn’t a conversation I expect—or want—to have with Levi. Not here, not now.
“Why did you agree to be with them?” He doesn’t wait for my permission to dive into such personal territory. His gaze probes, searching for something I’m not sure I’m ready to give.
“Is it any of your business?” I counter, trying to sound more defiant than I feel. My heart races, pounding a frantic rhythm against my chest.
“Maybe it is,” Levi says, holding my gaze with an intensity that tells me he’s not backing down. “Maybe it isn’t. But I want to know.”
I’m caught off guard by the raw curiosity in his voice, the way he looks at me like he genuinely cares about the answer. It’s disconcerting, this side of Levi I haven’t seen before.
“Because…” I start, but the words stick in my throat. How do you explain something you’re still trying to understand yourself? How do you tell someone that your heart led you somewhere unexpected?
“Because what?” Levi prompts, his thumb stroking over the skin of my wrist in a touch that’s both comforting and distracting.
“Because they make me happy,” I finally admit, my voice barely above a whisper. It’s the simplest truth, the core of all the tangled emotions and desires that I’ve been navigating.
“Both of them?” Levi’s question hangs in the air between us, heavy with implications I’m not sure I want to explore.
“Both of them,” I confirm, meeting his gaze squarely.
“Okay.” Levi nods slowly, as if digesting my words, as if they’re pieces of a puzzle he’s trying to solve. His grip on my arm loosens, but he doesn’t pull away.
