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On our climb back down the mountain, my aunt insists on inviting Aaron over to stay for the rest of the afternoon.

“You must have some tea and fruit after that long hike,” my aunt says. “And I’m sure Jessica would be very happy to spend

more time with you.”

I’m slightly horrified by this overt attempt at matchmaking, and it couldn’t have come at a worse time. With the note’s threat

looming over my head, the idea of having afternoon tea feels as frivolous and ill-advised as throwing a party while a tsunami

is visibly approaching from the shores.

“That’s really okay,” Aaron tries to say, exchanging a pointed look with me, but it’s futile. Once my aunt decides something,

even the gods can’t change her mind.

She isn’t known to be very subtle, either. As soon as we’re back home, she makes a vague excuse about needing to buy something

from the supermarket and all but ushers my uncle out the door with her.

“Jessica, make sure Aaron feels right at home,” she instructs. “And call if you need anything.”

Then she winks—actually, blatantly winks—before leaving us alone together.

I feel somewhat violent.

“You can sneak out now,” I tell Aaron. “I’ll make up a convincing excuse about why you had to go back early. Don’t worry,”

I can’t help adding, my tone sharpening on its own. “I’ll let her know how much we bonded.”

But he doesn’t leave. “What will you do?” he asks, suddenly serious. “After I send you the card, and you’ve confirmed who

the sender is? You’re not planning on confronting them alone, are you?”

I stare at him. “What else am I supposed to do? If I get anyone else involved, then they’ll find out whatever it is Jessica’s

hiding—not to mention that I’d have to explain the slight complication with the me-being-in-her-body thing.”

“But it could be dangerous,” he protests. “You don’t know what they’ll do.”

Don’t say anything you’ll regret, I warn myself. This is not the time for that. Just don’t say anything—

“Is it really me you’re concerned about?” I blurt out. My muscles are sore from the hike, and my clothes feel sticky on my

skin. Maybe that’s why it’s more difficult than usual to control my tongue. “Or is it only because I’m in Jessica’s body?”

He goes completely still.

“It’s because of her, isn’t it?” I guess, heat flooding my cheeks. “Well, don’t worry. I’ll do everything I can to protect her, so that when Jessica returns to her own body, you two can have your happy reunion and life will go on as it should. My aunt will be absolutely ecstatic, and I’ll be sure to get out of your way—”

“I don’t like Jessica,” he cuts in.

The words don’t register at first. I’m still talking. “I’ll be nothing but supportive. Everyone at school thinks you’re perfect

for each other. Leela and Celine do as well. It makes so much sense; Jessica’s the best. She’s gorgeous and talented and smart,

and so are you, and there’s no reason why... what did you say?”

“I don’t like Jessica,” he says, enunciating each syllable. “I already like someone else.”

My heart stops beating. “Who? Is it... is it someone you met in Paris? Or someone from our school? Or—”

“Are you pretending you don’t know?” he asks, the sharpness to his tone matching mine now. “Because I fear I’ve already made

it painfully obvious. I mean, I left the country because of you.”

Wait.

Pause.

Hold on.

“That makes no sense,” I tell him. I think I’m laughing, or shaking my head, or stepping backward. I don’t really know anymore.

I don’t know anything. “You... you left because you hated me. Because you rejected me. Because you didn’t care—”

His eyes flash. “I left because I couldn’t bear it.”

“What?”

“You,” he says, and the air escapes my lungs. He runs an agitated hand through his hair. “What I... felt for you. How much

I needed you. I thought I would lose my mind if I stayed any longer, if I... if we—” He cuts himself off, breathing hard.

“What?” I repeat, but this time there’s no anger in my voice, only shock. I blink at him, uncomprehending. I’m scared to speak again,

to make even the slightest sound, scared he’ll take the words back and tell me I imagined it.

“Surely you must have sensed it,” he says, coming to an abrupt stop, his expression distressed, almost desperate. “Even just

a little. I know... I know it took me too long to start looking at you the way you wanted. But near the end—once I did...”

“All I know,” I say very slowly, to make sure we’re speaking the same language, “is that you pulled away from me. Don’t you

remember?” Because I do, I want to add, though it’s hard to summon that old, humiliating rage when he’s looking at me this way. I remember every detail, even now. It’s all I’ve been able to think about since you left.

“Because I was scared,” Aaron says, gazing across the space at me like he can feel all those years burning between us. All

those nights after he left, when I would wait until the house was quiet before crying into my pillow, my knees hugged to my

chest, trying to dull the ache there. “I thought... if we ever became something more, I was sure I was going to disappoint

you.”

“That’s—how would that even be possible?” I demand. “You’re perfect, and I’m me, and I—I fell for you first. I’ve liked you for almost half my life, and you basically just admitted that you only saw me as a friend for most of

that time—”

“No, you think I’m perfect. You think everyone’s so much better than they really are, and you think you’re so much worse than you really are. I was only a goal to you,” he tells me, swallowing. “I was a dream, someone unattainable, something you built up inside your head. You forget how well I know you, Jenna. There’s nothing you want more than to want—you’ll obsess over something, and convince yourself that so long as you get it, you’ll be happy, but then once you do, you’re immediately dissatisfied and want something else.”

“That’s not true,” I start to protest, though I feel my tongue falter.

“I’ve seen it happen,” he says. “When you were thirteen, you begged for this dress for months and months, as if it was the

only thing you could ever look beautiful in, but after you got it for Christmas, you only wore it once because it wrinkled

too easily. I remember when you made it your goal to get over eighty percent on your end-of-year exams, and you were happy

for maybe a couple hours after you achieved it. Or when you claimed that all you wanted was to place in the top three for

the school’s essay contest, but before your certificate had even been printed, you were wishing out loud that you could come

in first for next year’s contest. And if I’d let myself kiss you that day—” His breath hitches. I watch him try to steady

himself against some invisible emotion.

“Maybe you would’ve been glad at first. Maybe you would’ve agreed if I’d asked you out. But what would have happened after two days? Two weeks? After you discovered that I’m not perfect—that I’m a coward, that I’m awful at making decisions and regret half the things I’ve done, that it’s nearly impossible for me to warm up to new people, that sometimes I’m hit with grief so heavy I can’t do anything except lie down in silence? After you realized there was no point wanting me anymore, because you already had me?”

I feel stripped to the bone, so exposed I wouldn’t be surprised if my skin was rubbed raw.

“If I’d kissed you,” he goes on, “you would have wanted me for an afternoon, and I would have wanted you for the rest of my

life. But even though I knew it wouldn’t work, I also knew that if I stayed, I wouldn’t be able to stop myself from kissing

you anyway.” The bitter crack of a smile. “I only have so much self-control.”

“So... you left for Paris,” I whisper.

“I fled to Paris,” he corrects. “They’d sent me an invite to their gifted kids’ program months before, and I’d planned to

decline, but then it seemed like the perfect opportunity to clear my head and stop myself from doing something I regretted.

But you see... it was absurd,” he says quietly, resting his head back against the wall. “There I was in this new city,

free to go anywhere I wanted, without anybody to tell me what to do, and I felt so—trapped. Almost claustrophobic. Every time

I thought of you, of how far away you were, the last time we were together, the room seemed to shrink around me.”

My voice catches over my next words. “What are you saying?”

“The world just felt smaller without you,” he tells me. It’s the kind of sentiment most people would be afraid to say out loud, but he looks me straight in the eye when he speaks, his chin lifted a few degrees, as if in challenge. “Or maybe you have a way of making the world feel bigger. I missed you. I’d miss you everywhere I went: in the car and at the mall and in the winter. I know I stayed there for a full year, but you must realize—by the end of the first week, I was ready to fly back. It was only out of pride that I didn’t. I still kept everything... I would check the time and weather back here—back home, where you are. I thought... I tried to convince myself again and again that there would be an expiration date on what I felt. That I only had to push past a certain point and I would be better. I wouldn’t want you so much. I wouldn’t need you so badly.”

“And?” I whisper. “Did it work?”

The corner of his mouth rises higher, a smile laced with self-mockery. “What do you think?”

I’m speechless.

I’m hallucinating. I must be hallucinating. There’s no way at all—

“I was completely wrong,” he says, and he moves forward. I freeze and stare at him as he bows his head before me, vulnerable,

sincere, pleading. I’m definitely hallucinating. “The second I saw you again, I realized there was no avoiding it. I was going

to want you either way. Even if you only cared for a day and then moved on... I could make myself live with that. I’m sorry

I understood too late, I really am. I promise, as soon as we find a way to undo this... curse of yours, I’ll make it up

to you.” He lets out a shaky breath. “But I can’t let you find this person alone. I’m concerned about you . Your soul. You have to be safe. I can’t—I can’t lose you again.”

“I will be safe,” I say weakly. “You can come with me, if you insist. I just...”

When he looks up at me, I can see the dark shadows of his lashes. The hope in his eyes. “Yes?”

“I think... I need to process everything,” I stammer, desperately trying to reorient myself. But there are too many limits to what I can say or do. If I tell him everything I want to, everything he’s right and wrong about, it’ll be Jessica’s lips forming the words, Jessica’s eyes he’ll be gazing into. So far, her life has felt like an escape from my own, but in this moment, it feels more like a cage, one I can’t claw my way out of. “There’s so much going on right now. Can we... can we please talk about this later?”

I track the movement in his throat, the way he attempts to hide his hurt. “Sure,” he says at last, reaching for the door behind

him. His fingers fumble around the knob twice before he grips it, his knuckles white. “Anything you want. I’ll be here, always.”

It usually takes twenty minutes to walk from my cousin’s house to Aaron’s.

But only ten minutes later, my phone chimes with the photo.

I zoom in on the birthday card, the two anonymous notes spread out on the bed next to me, my eyes flicking back and forth

between them, trying to match them up. I go over every single birthday message, but none of them looks exactly like the handwriting

I’m searching for.

Had we guessed wrong? Had I somehow missed a person in our year when I was organizing the card?

I slump back on the mattress and hold the notes up against the light, until the ripped paper turns almost translucent, the

dark orange shadows of my fingertips visible through it, and the letters seem to float over the surface. Think. What am I missing here? The notes look like they were scribbled out in a rush, but maybe that was the point. Maybe they’d thought to change their handwriting so I wouldn’t recognize it.

Which means that it’s—

Impossible. The word forms in the sound of Aaron’s voice, in the shape of an old memory. Fourteen years old, the soft days of summer

just behind us, the oak trees outside the library burning gold. We were studying, or he was—I had flipped my sketchbook open

to a random page and was testing out my new fine-liners.

“Do you want to see something cool?” I asked, tugging lightly at his sleeve. Only the very edge of it, where he’d rolled up

the fabric; I was scared to brush his skin, as if it were possible to transmit feeling through touch alone. A simple graze

of the hand, and he’d know of the nights I’d stayed awake, delusional, dying beneath the weight of what I wanted. “See, there’s

this cursive font....” My brows scrunched up in concentration as I looped my letters together. “And then there’s this block

font... and this formal font that should look good on school forms.... Which one do you think I should use this year?”

I’d hoped he would be impressed, but he’d just turned his head and laughed at me, the sun settling behind him, lighting the

silk strands of his hair the same brilliant orange as the autumn trees. “I like them all.”

“You have to choose one, Aaron,” I’d insisted. “This is important. They’re completely different styles.”

“But they’re all still your handwriting. I’d be able to tell it’s yours even if you mixed it with a hundred other people’s.”

I frowned down at the paper. “That can’t be true.”

“It’s like how every artist has their own recognizable style, even when they’re painting a new piece,” he said, shrugging.

“It’s impossible to really hide the person behind it, so long as you know where to look.”

My body bolts upright. I hadn’t wanted to agree with Aaron then, but now I can only pray he’s right. I squint at the handwriting

again, except this time, like it’s another painting. Every artist has their own style, their way of holding the pen, of interpreting

the world, capturing it in pieces. Even if they tried to mask their identity, they should still have left behind telltale

signs. So whose style is it?

When I finally find the answer, shock ripples through me.

I double-check it again, just to be safe. But the signs are there. Subtle, but distinct. The same swoop of the Y s, the same dash instead of a dot above the I s , the same cut of the T s, like they’re running out of time.

It’s her.

It has to be.