Chapter 2 The Rose Garden

Avery

My mom went overboard with the party. Gold and white balloon clusters crowd near the patio, and streamers twist across the ceiling as if she's competing with prom committees for best decor. There's a cake with my actual face printed on the frosting, somehow sweet and mortifying at the same time. She'd probably spent weeks planning every last detail, agonizing over color schemes and playlist choices, determined to make this the kind of send-off people would talk about for years. Relatives I see twice a year keep cornering me for photos, and the June heat is so brutal the icing has already started to slide off in slow motion, like even dessert wants to escape this backyard.

God, kill me now. I'd rather be taking my SATs again than fielding questions from Aunt Carol about my "future prospects."

"UCLA in the fall," I say for what feels like the hundredth time, my voice running on autopilot while my brain checks out entirely. "Communications major."

Please don't ask about Liam. Please don't ask about Liam. Please don't ask about Liam.

"Following that boyfriend of yours?" Aunt Linda asks, her wine glass already half empty, her eyebrows doing something suggestive that makes me want to disappear into the rose bushes.

Of course she asked. Of course she did.

I force my smile wider, the kind that makes my cheeks ache. "Just following my dreams, Aunt Linda."

And his, apparently, but we don't need to get into that right now.

That's when I see him. Liam walks through the side gate like he's done it a hundred times, backwards cap, that grin that gets me every single time no matter how many times I tell myself I'm immune to it by now. A small flutter rises in my stomach despite myself, an old reflex I can't seem to unlearn.

Seriously? Today? Of all the days to show up unannounced, he picks the one day my mom has every relative within a fifty-mile radius trapped in our backyard?

Not today, I think. Please let today just be about me for once.

"Surprise," he says, pulling me into a hug. He smells expensive, woody, like money and something I can't quite name.

And there it is. That scent. The one that makes me forget my own name.

"Oh my god, what are you doing here?" I pull back to look at him. "You said you had exams."

"Couldn't miss your big day." He kisses my forehead. "Where should we take pictures?"

He knows exactly where. He always knows. It's like he has a sixth sense for lighting.

We end up by my mom's rose garden, the light filtering through the trees in that soft late afternoon way that makes everything look edited even when it isn't. He pulls me close, his hand finding my waist, and I hold my phone out for the shot. I try to memorize the feeling, the warmth of his palm through my dress, the way the roses smell sweeter in the heat, wanting to believe this moment means as much to him as it does to me.

Just tilt your head a little more. Chin down. Smile like you mean it. Like you're not thinking about how this picture will get more likes than your actual graduation announcement.

Click. Click. Click.

This is the part where I'm supposed to feel like the luckiest girl at my own party. So why does something in my chest feel slightly off, like a picture hung a centimeter crooked. I push the thought away before it can take root, blaming it on nerves, on exhaustion, on the strange ache of an ending I'm not ready to face.

It's just the pressure of the party. The heat. The fact that my dad's already drunk and telling the same story about his college days to anyone who'll listen.

"These are gonna blow up," he says, scrolling through the photos. "You look incredible."

But do we look real? That's the real question, isn't it?

"We look good together," I say, mostly to convince myself.

"Yeah." His voice drops, softer now. "We really do."

I post one before we even leave the garden. Couldn't have done senior year without this one.

The likes start rolling in before we're even back at the party, that little dopamine hit hitting the same as always, except better this time, because this time there's an actual person attached to it. Real, standing next to me, not just a filtered memory. I glance at him again, half expecting the feeling to catch up with the image, but it stays just out of reach, like a song I can hear but can't quite name.

Most of the guests have left by the time the sun starts sinking for what feels like the second time that day, throwing long shadows across the yard. Liam pulls me away from what's left of my family, guiding me toward the back fence where my mom's hydrangeas hang heavy, their purple blooms bending the stems. The noise of the party fades behind us, replaced by the hush of early evening and the low hum of cicadas starting up in the grass.

Here it comes. The part where he says something sweet and I forget all about the weird feeling in my stomach.

"Hey." He takes both my hands. "Come visit me at UCLA this weekend."

"This weekend? I have so much to do. I have to pack for-"

And there's my mom's voice in my head. "Avery, you need to be responsible. You can't just drop everything for a boy." But God, I want to.

"I've got a surprise for you." His eyes light up in a way I haven't seen before, something almost electric. "Trust me. You're gonna love it."

My heart picks up speed. What is he planning. "What kind of surprise?"

"If I told you, it wouldn't be a surprise." He taps my nose. "Say yes."

I should check with my mom first. I should finish packing. I should do a hundred boring, responsible things that any reasonable person would do before their entire life changes in three months. Part of me wants to laugh at how easily he still pulls the strings, how quickly logic dissolves the moment he smiles like that.

But since when has reasonable ever made a good story.

"Yes," I say instead.

He kisses me right there against the fence, the hydrangeas brushing my arm, the last of the light turning everything gold and soft, like we're the only two people in a movie about to end well. For one suspended second, I let myself believe it, that this is simple, that this is happiness, uncomplicated and whole.

I don't see the kitchen window behind us. I don't see the shape standing there in the bright interior light, watching, arms crossed, completely still.