Page 58

If she walked in that door and saw me standing here, she’d probably huff and puff at Neil while nearly blowing a gasket, staring straight through me like I wasn’t even there. Because full honesty—it had always felt like she was looking right through me. Even if I didn’t recognize it for what it was until I was older.
A weird, uncomfortable,I don’t belong herevibe trickled through me, and I decided to stop waiting on Neil. I led myself down the hall and searched for him, peeking in the cracks of each door down his hallway. (No boundaries, that was me. Who was even surprised anymore? But I wasn’t standing alone in that room, feeling like I wanted to scratch through my skin, one second longer.)
I found him rifling through a desk. His bedroom was still the same one it had been when we were kids—two doors down and one more to the left.
I pushed his door open with a soft creak announcing my presence, and he glanced up, slightly startled to see me. His brows rose up toward his hairline, making two fascinating little creases across his forehead. Whether his surprise was because he hadn’t expected me to follow him down here, or just because I was walking into his room uninvited in general, was lost on me.
“Can we just do our work in here?” I asked. “I promise to behave,” I added with a forced smirk, trying to cover up the fact that I hadn’t felt comfortable in his house until I stepped inside his room.
But this was definitely more like the Neil I knew. It was a lot like I remembered, but I noted a few subtle differences, too. The sky-blue color that used to cover his walls was now a darker, ashier shade of blue. The shelves that used to hold buckets of race cars and model cars now held a record player, a row of vinyl records, some totally nerdy but admittedly cool Marvel action figures, and a bunch of his swimming trophies.
I still needed to get to one of his swim meets, stat. I mentally cursed at myself for lagging on that end.
Oh—and no more race car bed. I stifled a laugh, looking back at Neil with an eyebrow raised in question.
He still hadn’t answered me, and I was waiting on him to say something though he was clearly still busy thinking it over. Or… maybe he was deciding how he felt about me standing in the middle of his bedroom like this. If his deepening frown line had anything to say about it, I’d say I was probably right.
Huh.Interesting.
His eyes were glued to mine, completely locked in, and his cheeks were flushed, a bit pink. I would’ve put money on the fact that his heart was racing. If only I had the guts to actually reach over and check.
I wasn’t going to lie, though. My heart was beating faster, too.
I didn’t know which way this was going to go—which wayhewas going to go. I raised my eyebrow higher, a genuine smirk following in its wake this time, and he gave in with a quiet puff of air—not quite a sigh. “Sure,” he relented, and I relaxed into his safe space. I think he could sense my relief, and it made him feel a little better about his decision, the soft tinge of pink fading from his cheeks.
I let my backpack fall to the ground and plopped myself down next to it in the middle of his room.
I could’ve sat on the edge of his bed, since it was closer to where he was now lowering himself into his desk chair, watching me from the corner of his eyes, but it seemed like more than I could handle right now. Sitting on Neil’s bed would be far more dangerous than playing with fire; it would be like submerging myself in the whole damn inferno. So, obviously, that was a no-go.
And I didn’t want to push him any further than I already had.
He sighed again, an actual sigh this time, forfeiting yet another internal battle when it came to me (he seemed to be doing that a lot lately), and lowered himself to the floor, too.
But I caught the hint of his smile as he pulled his things from his backpack. And then we got to work. An English paper and math homework for me, and the same math homework plus ten chapters of“The Picture of Dorian Grey”to read for Neil.
I wasn’t actually sure why we were doing our homework together, except that Neil had asked me to, and it was the only reason I needed. I wasn’t going to turn him down. (Pathetic, I know, but it was what it was; I liked spending time with Neil.)
I mentally rolled my eyes at myself, and thenactuallygot to work on my assignments.
I was finished with calculus and halfway through writing my paper when I felt Neil’s attention on me, his eyes skating around in my periphery. My hand stilled, halting pen on paper in the middle of a word, before dragging the end of myyoff the page as I looked up at him.
He was peering over his book at me. All cute and intense and making my insides shaky.
“What?” I asked, eyes narrowed on him, while absolutelynotsmiling. Nope. Not I. I smothered that son-of-a-bitch down like it was asking for it.
“Nothing,” he answered with a shrug, his cheeks curving upward, hinting at a smirk, or a smile, that was hiding behind his book.
I leaned forward and slapped the book out of his hands, and it fell down into his lap. It only made him chuckle. He picked it back up, carefully folded the corner of the page he was on, and set it back down next to him.
And then his eyes were on mine again.
He was being all mysterious and quiet, not saying a word. His lips were perfectly still as he watched me, and I made a mental note of how it made me feel.(Anxious.)It was probably the first time I’d ever felt intimidated under someone’s gaze.
“What?” I asked again, attempting to brush away the feeling.
He got up, still not saying anything, and walked over to me, sitting down right next to me. I shifted to face him full-on.
“You’re distracting, Liv,” he finally said with a smirk, his brown eyes seemingly sinking into mine.