Page 28 of Reggie and Delilah's Year of Falling

He walks away to nowhere in particular, and I’m grateful for his generous gift of allowing me to have my tragic downfall without an audience.

“You aren’t following, are you?” Delilah says, her lips slightly upturned in that secret smile. She’s wearing a baggy gray jumpsuit, and her hair is tucked under a blue bucket hat.

“Not at all. I’m, like, yards behind you. Miles.”

“You... know who I am, though, right? You remember me?”

“Of course I remember you, Delilah!” I shout. I don’t mean to shout, but I’m just so fucking relieved that this isn’t going how I thought it was going. I mean, I still have no idea where it’s going, but at least I’m not about to be served a restraining order.

“And I remember you, Reggie. Or should I say Keepin’ It d100?” Her smile gets wider, and it feels like the first peek of sunshine in the morning. “So, it’s St. Patrick’s Day.”

“It is.” I look around at the few people wearing green. “Is this—I don’t know, uh, a special day to you or something? Sorry if you told me that and I forgot. But I can see why—why you like it? Green is a good color. And, like... leprechauns and shit.”

Before I can start spiraling again over the absolute garbage I’m spewing, Delilah falls forward in laughter, grabbing my arm to brace herself. Her touch shoots through my body, scrambling mysenses and stopping my heart. But, you know, in a good way.

“Leprechauns and shit?” she repeats, laughing some more. “Oh, you’re funny. I needed that.”

“You’re welcome?”

Her hand falls down, and it takes all of my self-control not to grab it back and hold it there forever. She tilts her head to study me, her eyes warm. “No, I’m not super into St. Patrick’s Day. Though, I am like a quarter Irish or something. My dad and sister got the red hair. And the freckles.”

“You have ’em too,” I mumble.

“Yeah.” She reaches up to touch them, almost like she forgot they were there. And I guess they are faint and I’m supposed to be a totally normal guy that’s run into her casually... Oh no, am I beingweirdweird? Roll it back, Reggie!

“Okay, so, today is St. Patrick’s Day,” she says. “And last time I saw you was Valentine’s Day. And the first time was New Year’s...”

She stares at me expectantly. It takes me a couple beats, but then it finally clicks. “Holidays!” I shout, pointing at her.

“Yes, holidays.”

“We keep meeting on holidays!”

“Yes, we do.”

“That’s like... that’s magical!” That earns me the biggest smile from her to date, and I wish it wouldn’t beweirdweird to take out my phone and snap a picture of that smile. I want to save it to study later tonight. And damn... I’m really not helping my case here.

“It’s definitely past just being a coincidence at this point,” she says.

And I don’t want her to think about that too much and realize what’s really going down, so I lean in to it. “The holiday magic keeps throwing us together! It’s like a movie. We’re probably supposed to save the world together or something.”

“Save the world?”

“Yeah, has anyone checked on Santa? The groundhog? Maybe they’re being threatened and it’s our job to save them, set things straight.”

“I love how the groundhog is next in line after Santa...”

“Homeboy controls the weather! When was he supposed to come out of his hole, anyway? Maybe that’s our mission! We’re his only hope!”

“So to summarize,” she says, smirking, “holiday magic is bringing us together so we can rescue a groundhog?”

I shrug. “Or you know, just so we can be friends.”

She looks down, bites her lip. And I worry I took it too far, let thatweirdweird pop out. But her big brown eyes lock on mine. “Well, mission accomplished, I guess. We’re officially friends.”

My chest feels all fluttery, like a horde of butterflies got unleashed. Actually, no, this is way more significant than that. It’s wyverns, flapping their meaty wings and shooting out flames.

“We did it!” I hold my hand up.

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