Page 175 of Seven Lost Summers
NateandImappedeverything out in the car for ten minutes, parked in the shadow of Quinn’s apartment block, rehearsing how to tell the one woman we both love that we fucking do.
We agreed he’d go first when the moment came. I understood how hard that was for him, because saying the words has never been his thing. But that was one hell of a moment when he finally told her.
My eyes have been on her since we stepped into this shoebox she calls an apartment. She’s still too fucking beautiful for my sanity, and she’s nervous, which bugs the shit out of me. This is Quinn Thomas. The girl who went head-to-head with half the assholes in our year and made them regret it. I watched her take on a quarterback back in school, and the guy walked away nursing more than his ego.
She’s standing there, arms crossed tight, chewing her lip hard enough that I’m half tempted to tell her she’s going to chew the damn thing off. Quinn Thomas. The same girl who once made a full-grown teacher cry for trying to take her camera. Now she’s holding herself small in her own place. Doesn’t she know she could own the whole damn room with a single look.
This is supposed to be my turn to tell her how I feel, but my head’s gone sideways, stuck on the question of what the hell happened to her.
Did some prick make her shrink in on herself the way they tried to do to me back in school?
Did someone cut her down enough that she stopped seeing who she really is?
Because the Quinn I remember never hid from anyone. The fact that she’s here now, holding herself like she’s afraid to spill over, makes me want to track down every single person who ever made her seem small and show them exactly how much damage I can do when I’m pissed.
I take a step closer, close enough that I can count every damn freckle dusting her nose.
“What happened to you, Quinn?” I ask.
“What do you mean?”
“What made you change?”
“Nothing made me change, Theo.”
“Sure,” I say, stepping closer. “And I’m a fucking nun.”
Her mouth twitches, but the smile dies fast. She lifts a shoulder, casual in a way that’s too practiced. “People change.”
“Quinn,” I say.
“No one did anything to me.” Her voice is flat, but I see her throat work hard around the words.
I close the gap by a step. “You gonna tell me, or am I supposed to start guessing? Because I’ve got all night and an impressive track record of being annoyingly persistent.”
Her arms tighten over her chest. “I told you. No one did anything to me.”
“That’s cute. Wrong, but cute.” I let the silence sit, heavy enough that she feels it, but not so heavy she bolts.
She exhales through her nose, eyes still fixed somewhere past my shoulder.
“Maybe… Bianca’s death changed who I am,” she says, her voice careful, like each word could splinter. “But you wouldn’t know… because I never saw you again.”
Her eyes drop, lashes shadowing her cheeks as if she’s bracing for me to argue.
But I don’t. I can’t.
Guilt digs in deep, cruel and unrelenting. I’d never considered what she must have gone through until she brought it up at our house.
“I’m sorry… I didn’t think about you back then,” I admit, the words tasting bitter in my mouth. “I couldn’t. I was drowning and I didn’t even try to look for anyone else in the water. That’s on me.”
Her chin trembles, and she shakes her head slightly. “You don’t understand, Theo. I had no one. Not one person who could grasp what it was like to lose her and still have to walk past the bench where we used to sit. Or step into the shop where she always laughed too loud. I faced that every single day.”
A tear slips down over her cheek and it breaks me to see the strong invincible Quinn falling still like Nate and I have these past seven fucking years.
“Everyone talked about how you and Nate were holding up, but no one asked me. No one even considered…” her throat tightens. “…no one thought I mattered in that grief. So yeah, maybe I have changed.”
I can’t stand that she’s hurting. I take her hand gently, pulling up the sleeve until I find her wrist, planting a soft kiss there, like I’m making a promise straight into her pulse.
