Page 124 of The Wild Card

Crew steps around him without a word and disappears into the kitchen. I hear the tap run. A glass fill.

I stand in the hallway, not sure where to go. My room feels too far away. The living room feels too open. Everything feels wrong.

Murphy meows again, louder this time, and head-butts my ankle.

“Yeah,” I whisper, bending down to scratch behind his ears. “I don’t know what to do either.”

From the kitchen, silence. Then the clink of a glass being set down.

I wait for footsteps. For his door to close. For the signal that this conversation—whatever it was—is over.

Instead, I hear his voice. Quiet. Tired.

“Chicken’s in the fridge. If you didn’t eat.”

A plain, unseasoned, meal-prepped chicken breast. God bless this man.

My throat tightens. “Thanks, Crew.”

He has no idea how to say I’m glad you’re safe. But I hear it anyway.

More silence. Then footsteps. His bedroom door closes with a soft click.

Murphy meows.

I sink down onto the floor, back against the wall, and pull the cat into my lap. He tolerates it for approximately four seconds before squirming free, but those four seconds are enough.

I think about Crew, driving in the dark, probably breaking every speed limit, probably white-knuckling the wheel the whole way—for me.

We’re not together. He made that clear.

But he still came.

I don’t know what to do with that.

Chapter Thirty

Roommates

Emmie

The silence is killing me.

Not the literal silence—there’s plenty of noise in the apartment. Murphy meowing for dinner. The hum of the refrigerator. The muffled sounds of Dallas traffic ten floors below. But the space between Crew and me has become this vast, echoey thing, filled with all the words we’re not saying.

I can’t live like this anymore.

So on a random Wednesday evening, when I hear his keys in the door, I do something stupid.

“Hey,” I call from the kitchen. “I made too much stir fry. You hungry?”

He freezes in the entryway. I can see him calculating—the risks of saying yes, the awkwardness of saying no. The way his eyes flick to the door like he’s considering making a run for it.

“You don’t have to,” I add quickly. “I just thought… we live together. We could try to be normal. Or whatever passes for normal with us.”

A long pause.

“Yeah,” he finally says. “Okay.”