Chapter Sixty-Seven

I ASK LIAM TO TAKE ME home early, even before the fireworks. Holidays have always been hard for us, so Campbell and Juniper and I made up our own traditions. Every New Year’s Eve, we sit on the roof outside my window and watch the fireworks over Auburn together. I’m not going to miss this one.

We park at the end of my road, near the mailboxes.

Liam gets out of the car and opens my door.

“Beautiful,” he says.

So I kiss him. My face and neck are cold, but Liam’s lips are warm.

Like all of the trees in Auburn, the ones around us are home to crows, and I hear them moving on their branches. They’re very unsettled tonight, shifting and cawing and fluttering off the branches and back again. Above them, the sky feels like a magnifying glass, focusing on us standing here. The night is so clear, and the stars are a river.

For a moment, it’s like nothing exists at all beyond us. It’s just me and Liam and the trees and the night sky.

The world revolves around us.

And the words rise in me of their own accord, fast, effortless, like air, racing unseen past that thing in my chest before it can catch them, and tumbling out into the cold air before I can think: “I love you.”

It feels good. And right. Liam’s arm tightens around me. He doesn’t miss a beat.

“Tell me something I don’t know,” he says, and he steals one, two, three more kisses, as warm as sunshine.

“No promises, though,” I add.

“Whatever you say, Barnes,” Liam says, pulling me in close.

The stars alone bear witness to the huge smile on my face.

Well, the stars and the crows.

“No promises,” I repeat.