Byron and I kept track of each other via text the next few days—and when I wasn’t around him in person, his KILLER was the furthest thing from my mind.

I knew I was coming up on a decision point.

I needed to either get over myself, my power, and his word…or own up to things and cut him free.

I tried imagining doing that, in a hundred different ways, but none of them felt right, and I had to admit that I honestly didn’t want to. I mean, Whitney had given him her blessing, saying my “contact list wasn’t wrong,” while fanning herself dramatically, Chance’s opinion didn’t entirely count, and it was so easy to close my eyes and remember what being looped under his arm felt like. Plus I could read all the texts we were writing, where he clearly liked me—like, if he was playing games, he needed to win an Oscar.

What if he’d been driving in a car accident where someone else died, and he just felt guilty? Or what if his uncle needed a kidney and he hadn’t given him one yet?

There were plenty of other reasons he could've had his KILLER and they didn’t all have to be about murdering me.

Which meant that it was time. To throw caution to the wind, and jump in with both feet…and maybe also other body parts.

**

Whitney had talked me into going to a party on Thursday being hosted by one of her Benefit Boys, as I had recently taken to thinking of her revolving door crew. She told me it was OK to invite Byron, so I did, but as usual, he texted saying he was busy.

I’m not happy about that fact though, he complained right afterwards.

Worried someone else there has read All Quiet on the Western Front? I teased him.

He sent a laughing emoji, then typed, I’m just jealous that they get to see you.

But we’re going out on Saturday. Unless your uncle changes his mind.

He won’t.

Good. I promise to be just as cute or more so then.

Send me a picture, Sunshine? he asked.

Another thing that normally dating people did that I hadn’t quite done yet. Another small bridge to cross—another block driven down a one way street. Sure, I typed back with very little hesitation.

Whitney banged on my door shortly thereafter and we took off.

**

The party wasn’t that far away, but I remembered why I hated situations like these the second we hit the door. The apartment wasn’t any bigger than ours, it was wall to wall people, the music was loud, so the shouting to be heard was louder, and anyone and everyone had access to the bar.

“Come on!” Whitney said, hauling me inside, oblivious to the way my head swiveled while I read everyone’s words: FOOTBALLER, RISK TAKER, PLAYERs one through four, a crew of WRESTLERs, DANCER, PAGEANT QUEEN. It was harder to keep track of everyone here than it was when I picked up shifts at the bar, because there we at least pretended that fire codes were a thing.

Whitney introduced me around to some of her friends—guys I hadn’t met—and I did my best to seem strategically unavailable without seeming rude, because I didn’t want anybody but Byron.

And that was what it came down to, really.

Coming here was only cementing my desire to be with him, KILLER and all.

Then I spotted a SEX GOD sitting in the corner.

Only…he didn’t look sexy, nor did he carry himself with the confidence of someone who’d earned that title. He was talking to a girl, FRIENDLY, who if she was a freshman, I would eat my non-existent hat. Senior year of high school, maybe? And he was doing that “talking at her” thing that was particularly soul crushing if you were polite, like her word told me she was—you were either waiting for a turn to speak that would never come, or you were waiting for a gap to escape, same-same.

Ditching boring, rude, self-centered men was an upper- level girl skill, and sometimes it took practice.

SEX GOD stood, smiled—I read his lips saying, “I’ll be back,” from where I sat, perched on the arm rest of an occupied chair—and I went over to her after he left.

“Hey! I don’t recognize you from campus,” I shouted in her direction, while smiling at her kindly.

She gave me a shy grin. “That’s because I’m not,” she shouted back. “My older sister snuck me in, she goes here.”

I had thoughts about that which were best left unsaid. “Do you know that dude at all?”

She frowned and quickly shook her head. “No—but I don’t know anyone here, really.”

I stuck my hand out. “Elle.”

“Sarah,” she said, taking it.

And then SEX GOD returned, holding a drink for himself, and a drink for her. He seemed slightly concerned by my presence, as he tried to pass a red Solo cup to Sarah.

“She’s underage,” I leaned forward and shouted at him, stopping him.

“So? It’s a party,” he shouted back.

First bad clue—well, second, after his word.

I shook my head, intercepting yet another attempted drink pass, pushing it back at him. “You drink it then,” I told him, and he frowned. At being cock-blocked, or something worse? I decided to experiment—I took the drink from him—and watched his eyes light up with hope.

That’s what I was afraid of. “Cheers!” I told him, only pretended to take a sip, grabbed Sarah’s arm, and pulled her through the house to find Whitney, getting chatted up in the corner by a GOOD LOVER. Looking at him, and his body language in relation to her, I believed it.

“Elle!” Whitney said, excited to introduce me.

“Not now, Whit—that guy in the corner—I’m pretty sure he put something in this,” I said, hoisting the Solo. Her eyes widened and she looked to Mr. GL here.

“Consider it handled,” he told me, and to Whitney, “I’ll be back,” and then he swam through the crowd to deal with it.

Sarah looked between the cup and me. “How—how did you know?” she asked.

I poured the doctored beer out into a potted plant nearby. “I just had a feeling.”

**

Whitney went on to have a good time while I hung out with Sarah, who was a sweet kid, until her sister came by to pick her up. Then my sober-ass drove Whitney’s not-sober-ass home.

I was halfway through wiping off my make-up when I realized I hadn’t gotten a picture for Byron. I picked up my phone to text him. I’m not feeling very cute anymore, sorry, I sent with a frowny face. It’s been a long night.

He instantly responded, What happened, Sunshine? Are you okay? I gave him the highlight reel of my evening. And here I thought I lived dangerously, he said, at the end of it.

Welcome to being a girl, I typed back.

The three dots of his incoming response spun for a very long time. I would never let anything bad happen to you, Elle.

I sat down on my bed, cross-legged, staring at my phone. I so very much wanted to believe that—and he’d never given me a reason not to. Unlike stupid SEX GOD, who had outed himself in the first 3 seconds of me knowing him.

Because usually people were what their words said they were, all the time, in hugely obvious ways!

…except for Byron.

So his KILLER thing had to be caused by some weird and totally subconscious or accidental guilt he had going on. Maybe he was just having a terrible year. But that word wasn’t him, or who he was.

I was sure of it.

I’d known him for too long now, and I was ready to give him the benefit of the doubt. He’d earned it and then some.

I know, I texted him back. I can’t wait to see you on Saturday.

Me too. Just two days away. G’night, Sunshine.