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We’re a mess. I don’t even know who’s winning anymore. But I don’t care.
Riven
This is the way it should be. Except it’s not. We’re down three. Lucien. Orin. Caspian.
Their absence sits heavy in the booth with us, like the ghost of a fist pressed to my ribs. But Silas is making obscene slurping sounds across from me, and Elias is muttering about germs while sipping from a cup he refuses to admit is half-whiskey. Ambrose is silent, brooding beside Luna like his very presence is a strategic threat. And Luna—gods, Luna—she’s sitting beside me, her thigh brushing mine under the table, acting like she doesn't notice that I'm vibrating with the effort it takes not to drag her out of here and into the shadows just so I canbreathe.
“This one’s cherry,” Silas announces, switching straws like it’s some kind of milkshake orgy. “You gotta try this one, Riven. It’s got bite.”
I glare at him. “You usedmystraw.”
“Sharing is caring, Kain.” He wiggles his brows.
Luna tries not to laugh. Her lips twitch, and I want to scowl at her for encouraging him, but I don’t. Not when she’s glowing like that under the flickering diner light. She’s in a hoodie again— mine, though she stole it so long ago it’s practically hers now. Her hair’s pulled up, loose strands curling down the nape of her neck. She smells like vanilla and ash and something else—something dangerous, like fate wearing lipstick.
“You’ve had three,” Ambrose says without looking up, voice like glass. “You’re going to crash.”
“Ilivecrashed,” Silas says brightly. “It’s my aesthetic.”
Elias slides a straw wrapper down the table and flicks it at Silas’s face. “You live feral. There's a difference.”
Silas catches it in his teeth and grins. “Don’t act like you wouldn’t kiss me right now.”
“I’d rather gargle bleach.”
“Liar,” Silas sings, but he turns back to Luna like she’s gravity. “You haven’t tried this one yet, sweetheart.”
“She’s got her own,” I growl before I can stop myself.
She turns to me slowly, eyes narrowing just slightly like she hears something deeper in my voice than she’s supposed to. “You don’t want to share your straw?”
“I don’t want you catching whatever disease Silas has.”
Silas gasps dramatically. “My diseases areluxury, thank you very much. Artisan-crafted. Small batch.”
Elias chokes on his drink. Ambrose exhales something close to a laugh, but it’s so clipped I can’t tell if it’s real or just a mechanical release of pressure.
Luna nudges my foot under the table. A nudge that feels like fire. “So you’d rather I usedyourstraw?” she murmurs, voice like silk laced with a dare.
She knows what she’s doing. Of course she does.
I grab her shake and take a sip, watching her over the rim. Her lips part slightly, like she wasn’t expecting that answer. Like she expected me to fold.
But I don’t fold.
Ever.
“That’s mine now,” I say.
Silas sighs. “Gods, the sexual repression in this booth could power the Hollow for a century.”
Luna’s eyes flick to me again, and this time the look is different. Heavier. She doesn’t smile. Because this isn’t a joke.
We’re sitting in a booth with plastic seats and chipped table corners. There’s ketchup on the wall and a flickering neon sign outside that hums like it’s singing to the void. And she’s here. Next to me. Wearing my hoodie. Letting me be close when I don’t deserve it.
This should be enough.
But it’s not.