“What will you do?” I asked curiously.

He looked at me as if I had just told him that cooking also involved cleaning the dishes.

“You’re not just going to sit there twiddling your thumbs with this information about your feelings.”

“I don’t even know if she really wants anything from me,” he tried to talk his way out of it.

I shook my head.

Why were guys often so lost? Wasn’t it obvious what to do?

“Then figure it out.”

“I don’t want anything to do with the pack.”

“Is Emely the pack?”

“No, but...”

“God,Julian, do you have to be forced to find happiness?”

Julian paused, saying nothing more. I seemed to have made him think. And if Emely meant something to him, then he had to act. Maybe then other things would fall into place, too. For example, the relationship between him and Nash.

“You should meet up with her.”

“We see each other a lot on campus, even at her family’s estate, yesterday.”

Of course,all the rich people here owned an estate. What else did I expect?

“I thought you wanted to stay away from the pack,” I thought out loud.

“My sister lives there now. She had to leave first, so my father could have more time to find a house.”

“What?”

The pack seemed stricter than expected. Hierarchies, bonds and now something like this? I didn’t like the idea of me having anything to do with that at all.

“Just don’t ask.”

And I didn’t. Instead, I returned to the Emely topic.

“As for Emely, you should meet up with her, undisturbed. Go to the diner together or do something you used to do as kids.”

“We used to chase frogs together.”

I laughed, amused. “Maybe something else?”

“Building booths in the garden.”

“Mh...” I was beginning to get the feeling that Julian had a lot of fond memories of that time buried inside him, and that somewhere in between there were probably feelings for Emely.

“There’s a tree house that we built.”

I looked at him with envy. That sounded like a perfect date.

“Meet her there.”

“Don’t you think that might seem weird?”