I nod. I don’t trust myself to speak when all I want to do is cry.
He takes a step forward. “I want to thank you. For helping me. I could not have done this without you. No,” he says as I shrug and try to wave his compliment away. “It’s true. I will not let you be modest. I had the elixir, yes, but I never could have made it through the wood without you guiding me, or guarding me against those dark monstrosities. Receiving the message my parents left behind for me, knowing they are safe—or, if not that, at least knowing where to look for them next—I cannot properly describe the relief that comes with that knowledge.”
I clear my throat. “Well, that is my job, you know. Guide and guard. It’s in my handbook.”
“That may be, but it is most certainly not your job to give a traveler like me a chance, to listen to him when he says he needs help, to shelter him and feed him and clothe him, or to show him there are marvelous things in this world that he can keep close to him all the days of his life.”
“Like TV?”
He closes the distance between us, his hands tentatively, shyly, brushing my arms. “Like you. You have something in you, Winter, that shines brighter than candle flame. You have opened up my world. You have shown me that the right person can make a poor fool like me happier than he ever thought possible.” He fingers twine through mine. His eyes darken and his voice scratches on something in his throat. “Frankly, I do not know what I will do without you.”
I know what I should say. I should say that’s ridiculous, that we barely know each other and we couldn’t possibly feel this strong a connection after just a couple days. I should say that love-at-first-sight crap is manufactured by Hollywood and the greeting-card companies to make young, impressionable girls want to see every single romantic comedy and beg their boyfriends to buy them Valentine’s Day cards and, someday, to plan the perfect wedding, the kind that fairy tales themselves couldn’t even compete with.
I should say I’m the kind of girl who has never believed in any of it. I was raised to be pragmatic, even before Dad disappeared and I realized the world isn’t this magical place, even though magic exists and I see it every day. It’s a hard world, where people can be taken from you in an instant and it’s better to keep your heart closed, to just do your job and keep your feet moving and never, ever, question things, because questions can lead to unhappiness and suspicion and guilt and all those other emotions that make up the tears in your eyes when you can’t fall asleep at night.
But I’m not that girl anymore. Henry has shown me there is something magical in the little things—the electrical charge that shoots down my back when skin touches skin; the indescribable connection I felt to him the second his eyes met mine that day in the wood, before I even knew who he was or what he wanted or that I was the only person in the world who could give it to him; the way I want him to kiss me so badly it hurts, an ache so deep inside that it has me leaning forward on my toes, my fingers squeezing his, my lips a breath from his lips, and then—
And then he kisses me. His bottom lip dances against mine, and it’s like a glass of iced tea on the hottest summer day. My muscles relax and my mind clears and there’s just this: Henry’s arms tightening around me, his lips soft as rose petals, his body hard and strong against mine. He could wrap me up like a blanket and make me disappear and it would be the best gift anyone has ever given me. To have a guardian of my very own.
The want, the need, is so great, it smothers me.
I push away from him. “Stop. I can’t do this.”
He places his hand against his heart. “Forgive me. I thought—”
“You thought wrong. I—I don’t want this.” My voice breaks on the words, but I inhale sharply and imagine the air in my lungs as pure steel. “You’re my friend, Henry. That’s all. Whatever you think you feel between the two of us, I don’t feel the same way.”
He takes a step back, and suddenly the room’s too cold. He looks down at the rug beneath our feet, his hair shielding his face from me. My hands reach for him but I pull them back. This is the way it has to be. What would telling him the truth accomplish?
It would only hurt more to have to say good-bye knowing that what we had was more than business, more than friendship, more than teenage hormones, or any other explanation science could come up with to explain why I’ve never wanted anything so badly as I want to keep him here next to me.
“Forgive me,” he says again.
“You’re a nice guy, Henry—”
“I should head downstairs,” he says. “Your mother will come looking for me soon if I do not.”
He heads for the door. I grab his hand, stopping him.
“Don’t,” I say, and the words rush up my throat, sliding across my tongue—I want you to stay, I feel something too, please don’t leave me tomorrow—but instead I say, “Don’t be mad. I don’t want to fight on our last night together.”
He deflates. “I am not angry, Winter,” he says, “but I cannot say in all good conscience that I am not disappointed. That is not your fault, though. I misread the situation.”
I gesture to the Oreo plate. “I brought you dessert.”
“I find I am not very hungry.”
I nod, the pain in my chest too sharp, too heavy, too impossible to breathe or think around. “Okay. Good night, Henry.”
He bows. “Good night, Miss Parish.”
He slips out the door, and I crumble onto my bed, crying silently so no one will hear.
*
I can’t sleep. I creep downstairs and peek into the family room. Henry lies on the couch, his arm bent behind his head, his lips slightly parted. His eyes are closed and his breathing is even. I grab a glass of water from the kitchen and take it into the study.
I sit at my father’s desk, my hands trailing over the dark oak and the leather ink blotter, and I wonder how much he gave up for the wood before it finally took his life. He and Mom met when she was in college, and from all their stories, it was as if he’d never loved anyone before her, but what if? What if he’d fallen in love with someone who would never understand his destiny, who would never believe him if he told her what he really did day after day, who would send him to a mental institution for even thinking such a thing was possible? Did he know what it was like to give up happiness in exchange for duty? I close my eyes and try to imagine what he would say to me, but it’s Henry’s voice that comes through instead.
I did not find your father’s journal.