Page 147 of Should Our Stars Collide

The video cuts off, but Kieran grins. “You don’t have to tell me twice.”

Now, all he needs to do is a quick Google search of the venue to see how stuck up he has to dress to be let in. It’s fine. Whatever he needs to do to get his man.

32

The restaurant is quiet in a rehearsed way, everything hushed and deliberate. Polished silver, crisp tablecloths, muted voices. The kind of bland, tasteless silence his parents thrive in. Sitting across from them now is like sitting across from a judge after being charged with disobedience. With his father being a cut-throat lawyer, the metaphor is hardly an exaggeration.

Ash cuts into his barramundi and half-listens to the same arguments he’s been subjected to intermittently ever since he left home for uni.

“So much wasted potential,” his father says, cutting into his steak with surgical precision. Ash briefly wonders if having that knife slice through him would hurt less than having to listen to the same arrogant crap again. “With your abilities, you could dominate the courtroom. Or business. Imagine knowing exactly what your competitor is thinking before they open their mouth. Instead, you waste it all on this—” He waves a hand dismissively. “Therapy nonsense.”

Ash takes a sip of water. He doesn’t bother correcting him just yet, knowing very well that offering no response is rebellious in itself.

He stabs another piece of fish, wondering what Kieran’s doing right now. Probably pacing the apartment, cursing Ash with every profane word he knows. He’s vocal about the things he hates. He doesn’t glide through the world, smooth and unnoticed. He barges. He stomps. He talks too loud and laughs even louder. He burns brightand fierce, like a star.

He’s everything Ash isn’t.

It’s not true that Ash didn’t want him here—there’s nothing he’d want more right now. He just couldn’t bear to see the expression on his face when he realizes how spineless Ash really is. Or worse—when he realizes how much he and his father are alike.

His father’s grating voice forces him back to reality.

“All those private schools, all those…abilities, and you sit in a chair while someone cries at you.”

He could argue—again—that having access to people’s minds is exactly why he’s good at helping them crawl out of pits they’ve been trapped in for years. That sometimes what he does is the only thing keeping someone alive.

Not that any of that would interest his father. If something doesn’t bring you money, reputation or power, there’s no point.

“I help people,” is all he says.

“Do you? How is listening to people whine about their problems helping them? You’re just an enabler, making them feel good about the mess in their heads. If you want to help them, you need to take action. Not sit there and listen to nobodies complain about how life is unfair to them.”

His hands curl around the cutlery. “They’re not nobodies to me.”

Doing what he does is the main reason why he hasn’t turned into acomplete2.0 version of his dad. Cultivating empathy—that’s what saved him. That, and spending lots of time with Gabe when they were kids.

His mother sips her wine delicately, not looking at either of them. That’s her role; quiet neutrality. Or maybe absence is a more suitable word. She doesn’t step in. She doesn’t defend. She doesn’t agree or disagree out loud, but Ash knows where she stands—by her husband, as she always has. Even with the trail of affairs he never bothered to hide. Yet here she is, firmly by his side, wearing indifference as an elegant dress. Their marriage is a performance for appearances’ sake, and they’re nothing more than two actors playing their roles.

A shudder runs through Ash. The thought that he was one reckless decision away from leading the exact same life will haunt him to his death.

The waiter comes to collect their plates, returning shortly with dessert. Its arrival marks the final act of the play. After that, Ash can go home to Kieran, and spend the rest of the day and night trying to redeem himself. It will be another year or so before he’ll have to subject himself to this shitstorm again.

Speaking of…this isn’t the first time his parents reached out to him since he met Kieran. They ‘requested he join them for dinner’ last year too, but he managed to sneak out and get through the whole thing in one piece without ever alerting Kieran.

He wonders, though, did Kieran know? Back then, did he know Ash was purposefully keeping something from him? It’d make sense, with the time-travel paradox and all. But if so, why didn’t he say anything? Why didn’t he rage and demand Ash let him get involved back then too?

In the past two years, Ash hasn’t said much about his parents—about his past in general, and yet Kieran never asked. He must have known, having come from the future, so why has he let Ash get away with it? It’s just…strange. It doesn’t fit Kieran at all.

Ash digs into the dessert just to give himself something to do, even though it tastes like nothing. No amount of sugar in the world could wash away the sour taste lingering in his mouth.

He’s about to take another bite when a different waiter appears.

“Excuse me, sir.” He’s addressing Ash’s father with that careful respect people default to when they sense authority. “There’s a gentleman at the front who claims he’s having lunch with you.”

Ash’s heart stutters, hope flaring up in his chest. He shouldn’t assume, it could be a coincidence, but then he catches the flicker of a thought in the waiter’s mind.

Messy hair. Sharp glare. Scowl like armor.

You stubborn little brat. What shall I do with you?