Page 39 of Born in the Spring

I forced my attention to the blackness above us, keeping the balance in my tone as I said, half playful, “You’re a natural.”

My observation was more a compliment for the first part of our lesson before we started horsing around. But it was allowed. She learned the basics, and quicker than most. So we didn’t have to be all work andnoplay.

Her snort drew my attention, my eyes starved for only her, and she met my gaze for another second before she looked away again. And it could’ve been the night. It could’ve been how we felt like the only two people in the world right then. It could’ve been my manic energy from being with her and being on the board, but I pressed at her.

“You still do that.” My voice was confident, but low with the pounding of my heart. “Look at me then look away. Why?”

I didn’t know what I wanted or expected Elara to say. She waswith my brother, so there wasn’t much I should’ve expected, or even anything I should’ve asked for. But the question was out, and I told myself it was an innocent one, and she could give me an innocent answer. But there was a reason, and I just needed an answer tosomething.

Her eyes flitted toward me, holding me in her side vision, but again, not head-on, every part of her stilled.

That was something about breathing in the cold. You couldn’t hide when you stopped.

“Your eyes,” she finally said, her voice low too, but shaky, little movement in her lips.

Time seemed to stop for me at those words, and I pressed her for more. “What about them?”

Her entire body came back to life with another shake as she said, “They’re not like Shepherd’s.”

That turn, of several reminders, added more weight to our words, more weight to me, and I felt like I was sinking in the snow as I looked back to the sky, dark like my scoffed laugh.

“I mean—”

“He has our parents’ eyes,” I muttered out through her attempt to amend, not feeling mended. They all shared the same brown shade. I didn’t have anyone’s eyes, at least not anyone in our immediate family. My greens were my own. Another way to set me apart.

“They’re beautiful, Jasper,” Elara murmured in a way to assure me, knowing my thoughts were playing the comparison game, and I was slow to react. Until thosethree words sunk in, as if they werethethree words, and I whipped her a look she didn’t meet.

And she wouldn’t be. She was just giving me a compliment. She was just trying to make me feel better. She was being a good friend.

So then why were there now small shifts of conflict in every curve of her face that had my head racing in a different direction?

She looks away because she likes them.

She looks away because she likes. . .

The space around us warmed, like there was a charge in the air, and if that’s what it was, she drained it out quickly, moving to stand and end our night. And I knew I should have let her,but I couldn’t, not yet, not after what should’ve been a simple compliment in her mind too giving herconflict. Like she wanted to take it back.

I couldn’t understand why.

Or I wouldn’t let myself try to.

“It’s getting late,” she said through an exhale, a tiredness in her voice, as she retrieved her helmet and her board. “Thank you for this,” she added with a smile, but that was tired too. “I had a good time.”

“Elara,” I called to her walking off as I rushed to join her on my feet, and when she stopped and turned to me, her face soft with expectancy, I snowballed, asking her something—something else—I shouldn’t, buthadto.

“What if I wasn’t a teenager when we met? Would it have still been my brother?”

Her lips parted with only a breath, and she tilted her head in a way that had me looking from her eyes now, wishing I knew how to shut my mouth.

She wasn’t going to answer. And it was an unfair question. The answer didn’t matter. Regardless, it would’ve hurt everyone and Elara wasn’t going to hurt anyone. I had already been hurt and I was still digging my own graves, and she wasn’t going to make anything worse for anyone.

ItwasShepherd. Not me. And there was nothing more to it.

“Goodnight, Jasper,” she murmured, and I nodded, swallowing the knot in my throat that kept me from saying it back.

And as I watched her stalk through the snow, I prayed even harder I could make it through the rest of my life if the rest of her life was with my brother.

Sixteen

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