Page 128 of The Fate Of Us

His eyes shot down to them for a second, feeling just how badly they were shaking,before connecting our eyes again. “Breathe.”

I tried to. I tried to suck in and steady myself but…

“You're okay, Addy.” His voice was soft, a delicate reassurance. “Take a breath andhold it, then think of something good. Okay?” I think I nodded. “Think of somewhere, someone safe, something familiar and happy. Think about it for a second or two and breathe out.”

“I… I don’t…” The words felt like knives slashing my throat as they tried to leave. “Idon’t know what… t-to think… of.”

I was panting at this point, so hard and heavy that I felt Nate pull me to the side, awayfrom the commotion and the lights, off to the side, in a bubble of our own.

“You can, Firefly; you're doing so well.” One of his hands slipped from mine and landed under my chin, keepingmy head from dropping, taking away from how heavy it felt. It also meant I had no choice but to look directly into those glacier-green eyes. “Think of anything that makes you happy.”

I think I gasped when a version of him played across my mind, although I couldn’t besure. But he was there.

He was there, in every form I’d ever known him. The twelve-year-old I’d hit in the facewith a water balloon. The thirteen-year-old who confessed that he hated birthdays. The eighteen-year-old who gave me my first kiss and told me he loved me. The twenty-one-year-old I saw on a billboard for the first time. The twenty-three-year-old I saw when I walked into that table read. The twenty-six-year-old who defended me and my sister the other night.

And every version I loved even more than the last.

The longer I held those memories in my mind, the easier it was to breathe. The venomoussnake that had wrapped itself around my heart slithered away, the knots untied, and the dread melted away. Things felt airy, and light. The clouds in my brain turned into bluer skies than the one that was on display today, feeling trickling back into my fingers.

I held Nate’s eyes the entire time, as he kept one hand under my chin and the other in myhand.

“How…” I muttered, shaking my head at him. “How did that work?”

As his hand fell from my chin, his head fell forward with a smile, big and beautiful, one Irarely get to see, before it stared right back at me. “It’s not hard to notice when someone’s having a panic attack when you’ve had them since you were four.”

Silence hummed between us. Not the kind we’d grown comfortable with; the neededkind. The kind of quiet moments that you need to let the words sink into your brain. It was my turn to search his eyes now, pools of green with flecks of sunlit gold, swimming in memories, drowning in coping techniques for what I just went through, that have plagued him his whole life.

I let a sniffle break the needed silence, my lungs taking in as much air as they could hold,savouring every breath. My eyes dipped to the grass, measuring up every blade, before I felt that pull to look back into his.

My lips, dry and quivering, barely pried open. “I don’t think I can do this anymore.”

Even without me scanning the set around us, he knew what I meant. I could tell. His facedidn’t move, just the tiniest tug on the corner of his mouth. If I’d have blinked, I would have missed it. “You know you don’t have to do anything you don’t want to, Addy.”

I felt my head shake. “I’m not meant to be here.” The words came out like Iwas trying to convince myself. Almost like I was finally saying what had been rotting in my head for years.

The only thing Nate did was smile, one that lit up his face as he said, “No, I don’t think you are.”

I couldn’t help but hang on to his smile—the way it sparkled, like he’d been saving it forthis moment. I held his eyes. “What do I do?”

The hand that was still holding mine squeezed gently, the pad of his thumb calmlyskating over my skin. Both our eyes fell onto it before I felt his return to me. “I’ve spent so much time with you, Addy, that I’m confident that you know exactly what you need to do."

I lifted my head to his, my eyes searching his for an answer that I shouldalready know, before I watched his head nod to the left, my eyes breaking from his and twisting my head to see where he gestured.

The exit.

My head twisted back to him, my hair nearly whipping me. “I can’t just leave, Nate—”

“Says who?” He whispered, like he was talking to my heart. His spine arches forward,levelling our heights. “You can do it, Addy.” His thumb rises to my face and swats away the tear I didn’t even realise had fallen. “You’ve got this, Firefly.”

Firefly.

“They’re lucky charms, you know? And they are a symbol of hope and rebirth.”Nate hadonce told me, as he read aloud from the encyclopedia, that was way too big for his hands. We were on the pier, soaking up the last moments of sun, doing some project for biology.

“You’re kinda like a firefly.”He’d said, lifting his head from the pages.

“How?”I’d asked, lifting mine from my notepad.

“Well, you’re hair. It’s like fire.”I rolled my eyes at that, but it didn’t stop the goofysmile from taking over my face.“And I suppose when you finally get through to your parents about acting, you’ll have your rebirth, and you’ll be much more hopeful.”

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