Page 28 of Summertime Hexy

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Rowan blinks. “Oh. Do you need help?”

“Nope! It’s a solo unicorn.”

And before he can ask what that means, I’m jogging away, journal clutched to my chest like a life preserver.

I duck behind the shed near the east path and finally let myselfbreathe.

I’m falling.

Gods help me, Iam.

And I hate it.

Because falling means losing control.

Falling means giving someone the power towreckyou.

And I’ve barely put myself back together.

But Derek?

He doesn’t feel like falling.

He feels likelanding.

Which might be worse.

—

I don’t know who I pissed off in a past life, but the gods clearly decided today was the day to collect.

Because I’m on a date.

Arealone.

With an elf who composts his own shampoo and calls love “an energetic alignment of truth.”

“Isn’t this nice?” Rowan says, gesturing to the picnic blanket he brought, which is neatly arranged under a sycamore tree like a damn fairy-tale magazine spread.

“Oh yeah,” I say, settling cross-legged on the blanket. “Just me, you, and fifty thousand allergens.”

He chuckles. Like a polite, non-committal exhale of joy. It’s the kind of sound that says “I read emotional boundaries pamphlets in my free time.”

He hands me a cup of chamomile fizzwater.

I take it and immediately regret everything.

“So,” he says, tucking a piece of hair behind one ear like he’s in a moonlight shampoo commercial, “I’ve been reading about the energetic resonance of soul knots. Fascinating stuff. Did you know some beings believe soul knots can form from shared magical trauma?”

“Neat,” I say, already dying inside. “So that time I almost got turned into a tree by a cursed dryad probably createdseveralknots.”

He blinks. “You’ve had a very eventful life.”

“That’s a word for it.”

We sip in silence.

Well, he sips. I try not to let my fizzwater bubble directly up my nose because I’m concentrating too hard onnot thinking about Derek.

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