Page 72 of Should Our Stars Collide

“You’re mean.”

Kieran rolls his eyes, but he seems to be having fun. For a bit. It doesn’t take long before he turns serious again.

“Listen, um… I know I said I wanted you to spill the beans once we got home, but I actually feel pretty…”

“Overwhelmed?”

“Yeah…” He glances up at Ash through his lashes, and damn, he has no business looking so pretty and innocent. “Raincheck?”

“We’re going at your pace, Kieran. You call all the shots.”

Kieran frowns. “Says the control freak?”

Ash lets out a wry chuckle. He can see how it can be confusing. “I’ve told you. Whatever I do, I do with your best interests at heart.”

Kieran sighs. He sounds tired, but not upset. “I must be crazy, but I think I’m starting to believe you.”

“I’m glad,” Ash says. Calmly. Evenly. Nothing like what he feels. It’s like freaking pompoms are having a party in his chest.

Kieran nods, shifting on his feet and cradling the mug between his hands. Dammit, why does he have to be so cute?!

“Well, that’s settled. But there’s one thing I wanna do today.”

“Which is?”

Kieran squares his shoulders, expression low-key murderous. “I wanna pay Zeke a visit.”

Ash presses his lips together and nods.

RIP my friend. It was nice knowing you.

18

Ripping Zeke a new one, that was the plan. Unfortunately, Kieran underestimated the exhausting nature of time travel, plane travel, and generally being in Ash’s close vicinity.

Which is why he’s flat on his back in bed at 6pm, staring at the ceiling of the guest bedroom like it holds solutions to this mess.

The room is too quiet. Too tidy. TooAsh,despite it not being the room they normally share. Even the throw blanket at the end of the bed is folded with military precision.

It’s annoying.

Everything Ash does is annoying. He’s too calm. Too composed. Tooeverything.Confusingly kind and patient, like he’s been engineered in a lab to be the perfect antidote to Kieran’s chaos.

Kieran flips onto his side. Then back. Then stares at the ceiling again. Fucking hell, he’s exhausted, so why won’t his brain shut up? Instead, it’s showing him a montage of the past three days, analyzing every single thing Ash has done or said.

“Whatever I do, I do for you. With your best interests at heart.”

“I like to think I make you happy.”

“You were the most intriguing thing I’ve ever seen.”

“I always want to be by your side.”

Kieran buries his face into a pillow and screams.

“I always want to be by your side.”

Ash had said it so simply, like he’s said it many times before. Likeit was a fact and not something that could flip Kieran’s life on its head and send him into an early mid-life crisis.