“What were you jealous of?”
“You.”
I blink, confused. “He doesn’t like me like that.”
“I know that now,” she says easily. “But I didn’t get why he was inviting you here. And it felt like a trick, the way he invited me, waited for me to say yes, and then was all, ‘Oh, yeah, Paige is coming too.’ ”
My ear snags on this last part. The part where she says that Fitz was inviting me too. It was always his plan to ask me to come? But then my brain catches up, and I have to ask. “You said yes? But I thought you dumped him because he didn’t know you were afraid of heights?”
“Seriously?” She shakes her head. “That’s a lousy reason to dump someone.”
“So why did you break up with him? And why’d you change your mind?” I concentrate very hard on keeping my voice steady. Unaffected. It’s fine. I’m fine.
“Promise not to say anything to Fitz?”
“Yes,” I answer immediately, without even stopping to consider if I mean it. Let’s face it, I’d promise to stick my feet in the fire to get this information.
“He told me that Darcy was going to be here …” She trails off meaningfully.
“And?” I prompt.
“And he wanted you two to meet.”
“Why?”
She raises her eyebrows, as if it should be obvious. I shrug, my way of saying obviously I don’t get whatever hints you’re dropping so spit it out already.
She sighs and puts a hand on mine, not unkindly. “Fitz invited you here to meet his sister because she’s a psychiatrist, and he hoped she could help you with your problems.”
“Fitz talked to you about my problems?” My voice is the coldest thing in this entire frozen town.
Molly withdraws her hand slowly. “He thinks that maybe you have anxiety because of the way you get stressed out by simple things.”
Simple things. Tears burn the backs of my eyes as the words echo in my brain, but I refuse to cry in front of her. Not about this.
“At first, I didn’t believe him. You seem so normal—”
I suck in a breath, and Molly quickly backtracks.
“Sorry! Wrong word choice. Not that you’re not normal, I just mean, you know, I never would have guessed that you have trouble making decisions and stuff. But I missed him, and when I saw you in the grocery store, you convinced me I made a mistake. So, I decided to come figure things out for myself. When I got here and saw the thing with the app, I realized he was telling the truth.”
I wrap my arms around my stomach, fighting the urge to puke. Shame and embarrassment burn my cheeks. How stupid could I be, thinking that Fitz wanted me here, even as a replacement for Molly. All he wanted was for his sister to fix me. He probably gave her a detailed list of everything that’s wrong with my brain and told her to diagnose me. No wonder she cornered me over the puzzle this morning. My head spins. I close my eyes, trying to make sense of this new information. But worse than all that, worse than Fitz lying about the reason he invited me here, worse even than him talking to Molly about me, is the one fact I can’t ignore.
Fitz thinks I have problems.
I always knew my brain was broken, but I foolishly thought he didn’t mind. I hate to have been so wrong about him.
“Did I say something wrong?” Molly frowns, clearly distraught. “I shouldn’t have said anything.”
“No, it’s okay. I’m glad you did. I’m going to help you.”
She squeezes my hands, gratitude radiating off her in waves. “What do I do? How do I get him back?”
“His favorite movie is When Harry Met Sally …” I wipe my eyes as Fitz’s footsteps pound down the stairs. He appears, and I burn with hurt and anger and embarrassment, but also with longing. When cool girls in romantic comedies get their feelings hurt by a guy, they stand up for themselves and say, “Screw you! I don’t need you!” But the fact is I’ve never been that cool and I’m still hopelessly in love with him. Even when he breaks my heart.
Fitz glances at us warily as he sheds his layers, unsure whether to stay or go.
“You two should go upstairs.” I nudge Molly to him. My heart breaks, but I’m doing the right thing. At the end of this trip, I’ll go home alone with SIM, his lists, and overwhelming regret for not going to New York when I had the chance.
But at least Fitz will be happy with Molly, and for once I’ll have done something right.
The lights in the cabin flick on as the heater wheezes to life.
Time to make a plan.
But first, I’ll call Jay and fix what I broke.
“What the hell?” Harrison looks at his dad and my mom with a mingled expression of fury and disbelief.
Because apparently philosophy quotes go down the drain when you walk in on your parents acting like teenagers.
Tyson and Mom spring apart. Mom’s hands are everywhere at once: covering her mouth and smoothing her hair and straightening her blouse. Tyson is equally caught, but flails about awkwardly, stammering and gesturing wildly as he sputters. “We, um—”
“Paige—” Mom says.
“I wish you hadn’t seen us like this—”
“We didn’t realize the time—”
“It wasn’t planned—”
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Harrison groans.
My heart is in my ears and my throat. Sweat prickles the back of my neck. It’s too much. And it’s hot in here. Oh my gosh, why is it so hot in here? I want to crack the window above the sink, but that would involve moving closer to our parents, an option that is very much off the table.
Harrison and his dad are fighting, and the sound is too much. Too loud. Too hot. Too awful. Too everything.
“I can’t breathe.”
“Harry, you have to understand—”
“Dad! You’re sick! You shouldn’t be—”
“Happy?” Tyson’s tone matches his son’s.
“Tyson—” Mom lays her hand gently on Tyson’s chest, which has an instant calming effect. He deflates.
“Harry, we’ll talk about this,” Tyson says.
“Screw that.” Harrison throws his arms up.
“I can’t breathe. I have to get out of here.” I turn to leave.
“Wait up. I’m coming.” Harrison follows me out the door as Tyson shouts, “Harry, wait!”
“Where do you want to go?” Harrison asks darkly as he follows me down the steps of his apartment building. I pick a direction without thinking, desperate to put space between myself and them. I gulp for air, but it’s icy and painful in my chest. The sun is gone, replaced by a thick layer of clouds.
“I can’t breathe,” I gasp. I double over, hands on my knees, and fight for air.
Rainbow. I need to find the rainbow. Everything is gray and black and muted and I can’t see anything red. Never mind. “Five things. Five things I can see.”
Harrison puts his hands on my shoulders. “Calm down. Stop freaking out.”
I shrug away from his hands. They feel wrong. “I see the street, taxis, tree branches, buildings, clouds.”
He takes a step back. “What?”