Now
The cigarette was his brand. Stephanie knew the exact weight of it between her fingers, the faint, stale smell of the unlit tobacco. She kept one in a tiny glass vial on her desk, a relic from a life before the fracture. She'd laugh if it didn't hurt to breathe. It started on the first of June. A day that felt like sunshine and stupid, easy laughter. A day that felt like nothing could go wrong because she knew, with every fiber of her being, that she wanted nothing to do with him.
Then
The restaurant was all clattering plates and shouted conversations, a cavernous pizza place popular with students for its cheap slices and tolerant noise level. Stephanie, in worn grey sweatpants and a faded band t-shirt, had not come to be seen. She'd come to decompress with her best friend Vanessa after a brutal week of finals, her hair in a careless knot, her mind on summer break and the quiet peace of her mom's house, not boys.
He entered her awareness like a shift in the light. A burst of louder laughter from a booth near the door. She glanced over. Four guys, still buzzing from some other event, all easy grins and casual sprawl. One of them, at the center, seemed to pull the energy of the room toward him without trying. Knox. She didn't know his name yet. She saw the confident set of his shoulders, the way his eyes scanned the room—not searching, just absorbing.
She looked away, dipping a breadstick in cold marinara. "I just want to eat my body weight in carbs and not think for seven days," she muttered to Vanessa.
"Amen, sister," Vanessa replied, stealing a breadstick.
Later, as they were gathering their things, his shadow fell across their table. "Hey."
Stephanie looked up, meeting his gaze. It was a clear, direct brown, holding a hint of amusement.
"Hi," she said, her tone flat, a clear dismissal. She turned back to Vanessa, who was now watching with undisguised interest.
He didn't move. "You look like you're having more fun over here. We're heading to a thing at the old quarry. You should come."
"No thanks," Stephanie said, not looking at him again. She shoved her phone into her bag. "We have plans."
"The plans look like sweatpants and going home. Live a little," he said, his voice a smooth, teasing baritone.
Vanessa kicked Stephanie's foot under the table. Stephanie ignored her. "I am living. I'm living right here, eating breadsticks. It's a full life."
He laughed, not offended. It was a warm sound. "Okay, artfully evasive. What about just your number then? For a less breadstick-centric adventure."
"I'm not interested in an adventure," she said, finally meeting his eyes again. She meant it. She saw the good looks, the charm, the whole package. It was a package that came with expectations, with drama, with the potential to derail the careful, controlled peace she'd built for herself. She had her mom, her own plans, her quiet independence. That was her ecosystem.
"Everyone's interested in an adventure," he countered, leaning a hand on their table. "They just forget until someone reminds them."
"Consider me un-reminded," she said, standing up and slinging her bag over her shoulder. Vanessa followed, a flurry of giggles and shrugged apologies to the guy.
They left him there. Stephanie felt his eyes on her back, but she didn't turn. She felt a prickling, strange triumph. See? she told herself. You are in control. You are not your mom in her lonely house. You can say no.
Outside, the June night was soft and warm. Their laughter was real now, giddy from the encounter. "He was so into you!" Vanessa squealed as they walked to the car.
"He was into the chase," Stephanie corrected, unlocking her beat-up sedan. "I'm not a chase. I'm a closed door."
She saw his group spilling out of the restaurant, piling into a Jeep. He was in the passenger seat. As she started her car, she saw him look over. He caught her eye through the windshield.
And he smiled. Not a smirk, but a genuine, appreciative smile, as if her refusal had been the most interesting part of his night. Then he lifted his chin, a silent, easy acknowledgment.
She looked away, her cheeks inexplicably warm. She pulled out onto the street, driving in the opposite direction. She didn't go back to her mother's house in the suburbs. She drove to the off-campus house she shared with Vanessa and two other girls during the school session, a sanctuary of cluttered rooms and borrowed time.
An hour later, showered and in her own bed, the familiar sounds of the house settling around her, her phone buzzed on the nightstand. A text from an unknown number.
Unknown: Most people just say yes to the quarry. It's easier. You're not easy. I like that.
She stared at the words glowing in the dark room. Her heart, against all her principles, gave a hard, single thump. Knox. She didn't know how she knew, but she did. It felt like a door she'd firmly bolted had just been tapped on from the other side, a whisper of a knock that echoed in the silence.
She didn't reply. She placed the phone face down on her nightstand, a firm, final gesture. Closed door, she thought.
It was the first of June. And it was the last night she would ever feel so firmly in control of where her heart was going. She had closed a chapter without giving him what he wanted. She just didn't know yet that he had already begun writing the next one, and in his story, she was no longer the author, but a character slowly, irresistibly, being written into obsession.