That’s it.

The only contact I’ve had from him in three days.

It makes me so nervous.

* * *

“Olivia!”

Ava’s voice punctures my daydreaming as I walk from college toward the dorms. I look up. My roommate is running up to me with an excitable smile on her face. Her and I haven’t really seen each other since the night I spent with Spencer other than brief moments in the morning and evening before bed. Not out of any malice or anything, just busyness.

“Ava!”

She gives me a tight hug. “It feels like I haven’t seen you for ages,” she says. “We need to catch up.”

“We really do,” I reply.

“Are you going to class?” she asks me.

“No, I actually just finished.”

“Me too! Let’s get a coffee. I’m buying.”

I shake my head and nod toward the dorms. “It’s okay. I think I’m just going to go home.”

“Olivia, I’m buying you a coffee whether or not you like it.”

We make the long walk to The Oak. Ava insists on nowhere else but her favorite coffee shop.

“You’re not like your normal self,” she remarks to me as we stroll down Crystal River’s sidewalks.

I blink at her. “What do you mean?” I ask.

“You’re different. Less... bouncy.”

“Bouncy?”

“You know what I mean,” she says. “Is something up?”

I think about Spencer. About our illicit quasi-relationship. About how things seem to always be up or down with him. How I had first thought he was a liar, but then found out about Quinn and Daisy. There’s so much there to unpack. I need to process it all somehow.

And I can’t say a single word about it to my roommate.

I shrug. “I guess I’ve just been feeling a tiny bit down these last few days.”

“Oh.”

Ava doesn’t seem that convinced, but she’s never been dumb enough to be fooled.

We make it to The Oak. True to her promise, Ava buys me that coffee. We have it to-go, taking the cups to the park opposite.

The same park where all that craziness happened the other day.

It’s hard to shake my head free of that.

I actually got freaking slapped...

“How’s your dad’s...situation?” I ask her, hoping to change the subject before I accidentally blabber off too much and reveal things I shouldn’t.