Prologue
Clara
“I feel so stupid.”
Dax holds the door open for me. Taking my hand, he leads me away from the music. Away from my date, Hunter, and the line of women waiting to dance with him.
My eyes blur as the cool breeze fans my flushed cheeks. I grip Dax’s hand, and we make our way to his car in the sea of trucks and sedans littering the parking lot and field.
I try to hold my dress up as Dax walks faster, his lean muscles angry against his dress shirt. With my free hand, I clutch his coat tighter over my shoulders, but my long dress gets in the way. I gasp, tripping over it, and curse myself for listening to my mom. She insisted I buy this puffy dress instead of the short, sassy one I wanted.
“Freaking dress,” I mumble, falling into Dax’s arms.
His strong arms.
“You shouldn’t feel stupid,” he whispers. He doesn’t seem to mind that I’m gripping his forearms like I’m falling off a ledge instead of tripping over my prom dress. His gaze bores into mine, his jaw set. “You didn’t do anything wrong. Hunter’s just an ass.”
Of course, he’s comforting me once again. He’s always there for me, sticking up for me as I date asshole after asshole.
“Besides, we got Mr. Davis back for shushing us during class when it was really Sarah who has a loud mouth.” He chuckles, and his warm, minty breath soothes me.
His lips are close.
My laugh gets caught in my throat.
His ghost of a smile transforms into a firm line as he searches my face, like he wants an answer to a question he never asked.
The air around us shifts.
We’re not supposed to be gazing at each other like this, with fire in our eyes. We’re friends. We’ve been best friends since we were six.
Even so, I suddenly wonder what his lips taste like. What he sounds like when he kisses a girl. If he wraps her up and consumes her.
The longer we stare at each other, the more I forget my date.
Prom.
Going home.
I lean in, just an inch, my mouth falling open.
“Clara,” he strains.
I stare up at him as his tongue slides across his bottom lip in slow motion. What am I doing?
I clear my throat and try to shake myself out of this trance, but he holds me in place.
My fingers are splayed across his chest, and underneath his thin button-up, his heart thunders against my palms.
He dips his head, and my eyebrows furrow in anticipation, need, and a little surprise.
We’ve never crossed this line.
When his lips touch mine, I still. He moves his lips across mine more firmly, and I forget everything before this moment. All the douchebags I’ve gone out with. The stress of graduation in a few weeks. College in the fall.
It’s just Dax and me underneath the stars, in our own corner of the world.
My breath hitches, and he rests his forehead to mine like he needs a minute.
He smiles, then kisses me again.
Commotion from the gymnasium breaks us apart. Students file out, howling and shoving each other around.
Dax and I face each other with matching surprised grins.
“I promised your parents I’d take care of you and get you home safely. I don’t think this is what they had in mind.” He chuckles, then exhales, scratching the back of his head like he’s suddenly shy. “I should get you home.”
“Okay,” I whisper, my heart fluttering.
He pauses, then dips his head again to steal one more kiss, and it makes me smile the whole way home.
At my front door, I close my eyes as he kisses my temple. “I dreaded going to this dance,” he says. “But it ended better than I could’ve hoped for. I’ll call you first thing in the morning.”
I nod, touching my fingertips to my lips. They’re still tingling from his kiss. From my best friend’s kiss.
He takes the steps down, then walks backward toward his truck. “And Clara?”
“Yeah?”
“Dream about me tonight, will you?”
“Definitely,” I whisper, sure that he can’t hear me, but he smiles like he knows exactly how much my entire teenage body is buzzing.
After he backs out of the driveway, I practically skip up to my room. Once I change and lie in bed, my smile is still there like it’s glued to my face. Like the time Dax glued Froot Loops to my cheek when I was asleep—one of his many pranks.
It’s hard to sleep.
Hard to think straight.
I can’t even think about what this means for us, because I’m too consumed with how fast my heart is beating. It’s deafening here in my otherwise silent room.
A few hours later, when I finally fall asleep, I dream of Dax.
The guy I’ve been friends with for so long, but when we kissed, it didn’t feel weird like I thought it might. It wasn’t sloppy or awkward. I wasn’t embarrassed or uncomfortable like I have been with Hunter and the other guys I’ve kissed.
With Dax, it felt right.
The second I open my eyes in the morning, I reach for my phone on the nightstand.
My giddiness from last night reappears when I read Dax’s name on my phone, but there are many notifications. The sun’s barely up—why would I have so many missed calls and texts?
Frowning, I scroll down. They’re all from Dax and an unknown number in the area.
The most recent texts say there’s been an accident.
He needs me.
Please come.
Dread fills every crevice of my body.
I call Dax, but it goes straight to voice mail. I call the unknown number, and the receptionist at Sunnyville General answers.
I hang up without a word and race around my room to change. I rush through the living room with my dad on my heel, a steaming cup of coffee in one hand and a newspaper in the other. “How was the dance last night? Dax brought you home, right? I don’t need to shake down that Hunter kid with my chainsaw bit, do I?”
I barely register what he’s saying as I fling the door open and almost run off the porch.
“Where are you off to in such a rush?”
“I’ll be back later,” I manage, my mind racing with worst-case scenarios.
What happened last night? Was he in an accident after he dropped me off?
“He’s okay. Obviously. He texted me after the accident. He’s fine.” I chant these words until I pull into an empty spot by the ER.
I rush inside, scanning the waiting room until I find Dax in the corner. He doesn’t see me right away. As I walk toward him, he leans forward with his hands together like he’s praying, his elbows on his knees.
His body is rigid.
His eyes are bloodshot.
“Dax?” I whisper when I reach him, swallowing my sob. “What’s going on?”
He doesn’t immediately answer me, but when he does, his eyes are vacant.
“They’re gone, Clara. They’re gone.”
One
Fifteen years later…
Dax
“You had a heart attack.”
Ed smiles like I told him his heart is cured. “That’s what they told me.”
“I just want to make sure you understand how serious this is.” I scratch my chin, confused by his unwavering expression. “This was your second heart attack in the last year, and it was only a month ago. You shouldn’t be moving furniture.”