Chapter 64 One Word

Chapter 64 One Word
POV: Zara

I didn't even text back. I just ran.

Out of the cafeteria, past Mr. Reyes calling my name from his office doorway, straight out the side doors and into the parking lot, my phone clutched so tight in my hand it dug into my palm. Help. One word from Eli's number, the first sign of life since that door slammed and his voice went cold last night. I didn't care about hall passes. I didn't care about anything except finding him.

I called the number. It rang twice and picked up, but it wasn't his voice that answered.

"Zara." Naomi. Breathless, fast, real this time, not a stranger pretending. "Zara, it's me, it's actually me. I have his phone because mine died and I found yours pinned at the top of his messages and I didn't know what else to"

"Where is he? Is he okay? Who knocked on his door last night?"

"He's okay," she said quickly. "He's okay, I promise, he's standing right here. It was our uncle. He showed up out of nowhere, the one nobody's seen in two years, and Eli thought for one second it was somebody dangerous and panicked and dropped his phone and it cracked and died and he's been trying to find a way to charge it ever since, I swear that's all it was."

I stood there in the parking lot, my knees nearly buckling with relief so sudden it almost knocked me sideways. "You scared me to death, Naomi."

"I know. I'm sorry." Her voice cracked on the word sorry, and for a second neither of us said anything, the silence stretching out heavier than it had any right to be after something that ended up being nothing. "I have to go. He needs his phone back. I just I wanted you to know he's safe."

She hung up before I could say anything else, before I could ask her about the note, about the handwriting, about any of the hundred questions still sitting unanswered in my chest. But Eli was safe. That was the only thing that mattered enough to hold onto right then.

The days that followed moved strange and slow, like time itself couldn't decide what speed to settle into. Jade's review dragged on behind closed doors. The school board meeting Eli threatened got scheduled for the week after the town bonfire, which was now exactly three days away, the biggest night of the whole summer creeping closer whether any of us felt ready for it or not.

And Naomi went quiet again.

Not the cold, locked-door quiet from before. Something softer, more uncertain, like she was standing at the edge of something and couldn't decide if she wanted to step over it. I didn't push. I'd learned that pushing only made the door shut harder.

I was lying on my bed Thursday afternoon, staring at the ceiling, replaying the sound of her voice cracking on that phone call, when my screen lit up.

Naomi Maddox.

My whole body went still.

One word. Just one, sitting there in a little gray bubble like it hadn't just stopped my heart cold.

Hey.

That was it. No explanation. No apology, no excuse, not even a question mark to soften it into something easier to answer. Just hey, dropped into a conversation that had been broken for almost a week, like she expected me to know exactly what to do with it.

I sat up so fast my head spun. I read it four times, like the fifth read might reveal some hidden meaning buried inside two letters and an H. My thumb hovered over the keyboard and then pulled back, hovered again, pulled back again, my mind racing through a dozen different replies and rejecting every single one before I'd even typed a full word.

Hey back felt too small, like I was pretending none of this happened. I'm so glad you texted felt too desperate, too much like begging for a friendship I wasn't sure I still had a right to. I'm sorry it felt right and also nowhere close to enough, three letters trying to cover everything from the almost-kiss to the video to every silent day that followed.

I set the phone down on my comforter and just stared at it instead, the message still glowing there, waiting.

Twenty minutes passed. Then forty. I got up, paced my room, sat back down, picked the phone up, put it down again without typing anything at all. My mom knocked once to ask about dinner, and I told her I wasn't hungry without even really hearing the question, my whole brain stuck on that one tiny word lighting up my screen.

An hour in, I finally made myself type something, deleting it, retyping it, deleting it again, until I landed on five words that felt at least honest, even if they weren't perfect.

I've missed you so much.

I hit send before I could second-guess it one more time and immediately regretted not saying something bigger, something that actually matched the size of everything I'd been carrying since that night on the porch.

The typing bubble appeared under my message almost instantly, like she'd been sitting there with her thumbs ready the whole time, waiting on me the same way I'd been waiting on her.

It stayed there for a long moment. Then it disappeared. Then it came back.

Finally, her reply landed, and it knocked every bit of air straight out of my chest.

I know who's been sending you those messages. I've known since the night they took me. I didn't tell you because I was scared of what you'd do if you found out it was someone you trust completely.