Page 84 of Caden & Theo

“Still got the photos in the attic,” he teases. “Your mother loves that one where you’re blinking and look terrified.”

“Iwasterrified.”

We both laugh.

“I’ll see you when you get back,” he says. “Want us to drive you to the airport?”

“Nah, I’ll grab a car. But maybe dinner when I get home?”

“Sounds good.”

We hang up, and I sit for a long moment in the quiet that follows. The hum of the gym’s HVAC returns, low and steady. Outside, the city moves on without me.

I look back toward my Mac. “Theo.” I let myself whisper it once, just to hear it aloud. His name settles in the air like dust in a beam of light—soft, weightless, and somehow impossible to ignore.

My chest tightens. I press the heels of my hands against my eyes and breathe in deeply, hoping to ground myself in the present, but all I feel is the stretch of time folding in on itself.

The boy I loved. The man I lost.

Tomorrow, I go back.

Back to the town I haven’t set foot in since everything changed.

Back to the place where I learned how to jump—and where I learned how far you can fall.

And maybe… maybe back to the one person I never stopped missing.

I reach for my phone, set it to charge before I head out to see my final client, and murmur into my quiet office, “Please be there.”

Because ready or not, I’m going home.

EIGHTEEN

THEO

By the timeI finally lock up my classroom for the day, my shoulders ache, and I’m half convinced my planning skills have staged a walkout. School officially ended two days ago, but I’ve been coming in to tie up loose ends—sorting lesson plans, organizing a couple things for next year so I can get ahead. Somehow it’s more exhausting than a regular day with students. Instead of grading freshman essays onThe Outsidersor steering seniors through college application panic, it’s me versus a mountain of binders and a copier that jams if you look at it wrong.

When I step out into the parking lot, the sun’s dipping low over Gomillion, throwing a syrupy, golden haze over everything. It smells like crepe myrtle and someone grilling three streets over. A warm breeze rustles the faded American flag in front of city hall, and it flutters like a lazy wave hello.

The school’s smack in the center of town, which honestly has a classic small-town South Carolina vibe, the kind of charm developers try to fake in cities but never quite get right. We’ve got one blinking red light, a diner with peach cobbler so good, it ought to be illegal, and storefronts that haven’t changed since I was a kid. Even the font on the hardware store sign is the same.

The bunting’s already up outside the small gym. Red and gold ribbons flutter under the banner that readsWelcome Back, Millions! Class of 2005 Reunion Weekend.Someone even added a big foam millipede cutout near the steps. It’s ridiculous, nostalgic, and weirdly touching.

I smile, but it’s tight.

I’ve spent the past week helping fine-tune the last-minute details of this thing—meetings during lunch, phone calls after work, spreadsheets and sign-up sheets that keep multiplying like rabbits. But now, the real part’s starting.

The people are coming.

Heis coming.

I’m just about to cut across the road to pick up bread from the store when a voice calls out from behind me.

“Hey, Theo.”

I turn and spot Emmett Pearce leaning against his gray Toyota Tacoma, looking like he’s on his way somewhere but in no particular rush. His smirk is as familiar as the dusty welcome mat outside the bakery.

“Emmett,” I say with a chuckle. “Didn’t I just see you arguing with Martha over shipping rates last week?”