The snowball fight had left Silver feeling like someone had temporarily rewired her emotional circuitry, replacing her usual defensive skepticism with something dangerously close to genuine happiness.
She'd returned to her dorm that Thursday afternoon flushed and breathless, her cheap drugstore gloves completely soaked through, bits of snow still clinging to her hair despite her attempts to brush them away. The sound of her own laughter kept echoing in her head like music she couldn't quite shake—unguarded, messy, real in a way that felt both terrifying and addictive.
And then there was the memory of Eli's grin. Not his usual careful almost-smile or the controlled expression he wore during their literature seminars, but something completely unfiltered that had transformed his entire face and made her stomach execute what felt like a flawless triple jump.
