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“Anyone else would have left it for her to find,” Jesse commented.
“I’m not anyone,” Raina said quietly, holding out the phone for him.
Jesse was careful not to let their fingers touch as he took the device. “Thank you.”
Without waiting for a reply, Jesse hurried off. Unlike most people, Nicole couldn’t be separated from her phone for more than a few hours, and he had no idea when she’d last posted a TikTok. She was extremely proud of the fact that she had recently hit 25,000 TikTok followers. Because of that, she followed a strict posting schedule.
“Jesse!” Nicole exclaimed.
Jesse blinked, surprised to find himself standing in the common room. When had he gotten there?
Before he could respond, she hurried on, “By any chance do you happen to have my phone? I think I left it in the library, and I need to make a call.”
“Yup, I got it. You left it on the table.”
“Good, because I also have to post in a couple minutes. It’s one of the videos you filmed.”
Jesse groaned good naturedly. “Oh, yay.”
Nicole laughed. “When will you make your own TikTok account?”
“Not anytime soon,” Jesse answered honestly. “You know I hate being on camera, and the only reason I made those videos with you is because you guilted me into it.”
Nicole pouted. “Ugh, fine. But just so you know, my followers really want you to make your own account. They keep asking me if we’re dating or something.”
“Funny,” Jesse said with a laugh, ignoring the pang of regret that shot through his chest. “I hope you shot them down.”
Nicole didn’t respond for a second. Then, “Totally.”
The two headed toward the stairs, pausing at the bottom of the steps to say goodbye. As Nicole climbed back upstairs, Jesse allowed himself a moment to think of what could have been, if only she had said yes. Nicole was easy—he knew her. It would have been easy to fall into a relationship, but that hadn’t been what she’d wanted. He’d made peace with it, but especially now, after everything that had gone down with Raina, Jesse was wondering if he was cursed.
ChapterSix
“Do you think Juliet should have killed herself?” Jesse posed the question to his table mate, eyeing her as he waited for her answer.
“I don’t think she knew any better,” Raina said thoughtfully, twirling a strand of her light hair in her fingers. “She’s a young girl with no real experience with romance. This is her first love, her first marriage, and it’s all new to her. So when she discovers her lover dead, of course her natural inclination is to join him.”
“Yeah, but what if the story was set in the modern day?” Jesse persisted. “Would she have chosen to take her own life and be with Romeo, or to stay alive and struggle on her own?”
“I would hope that modern-day Juliet would know better. In the 14th century, things were different. There was a lot of pressure on her to marry into the right family.”
Jesse tilted his head, noting how Raina talked to her lap. She’d mentioned something before regarding her family weeks ago, back when they’d been close. “Is it like that in the Jewish world?”
“In my community? Not really,” Raina answered. “My parents want me to date and marry someone within the Jewish community, of course. But I’m only sixteen. They’re not pressuring me to get married or anything. My mom may be strict in some areas, but she wants the best for all of us. And she knows marrying me off at sixteen is not what’s best for me.”
Jesse laughed. “So, like, dating someone not Jewish is a no-no?”
“Very much so. Because then my kids might not be raised Jewish, breaking centuries of traditions.”
It was a little hard for Jesse to comprehend. Sure, as an Ashcroft, he had expectations set upon him at birth. But his parents were very lax. During their rare phone calls, they never told Jesse to do anything. They let him do what he wanted, and that’s all he’d ever known.
“But what if falling in love with the wrong person is worth it? Romeo and Juliet certainly seemed to think so.”
Raina had begun to reach for her laptop, but she halted with one hand in mid-air. Disbelief and shock practically poured from her as she opened her mouth to speak. “It’s—” She stopped speaking as her phone started ringing, shooting Jesse an apologetic smile. “I’m sorry, I have to take this.”
“I’m going to run to the bathroom.”
* * *
