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“Exactly, it didn’t count.” He grins at me. “It didn’t change anything about our friendship.”

It did, though. At least for me.

Maybe not outwardly, but for weeks after that party I couldn’t focus on my schoolwork. I got my first-ever C on an exam, a chemistry midterm that confused me almost as much as my feelings toward Liam.

“It still applies,” he says. “If we kissed right now, it wouldn’t change anything. It’d be easy for us to go back to being friends. Easy for me, anyway.”

He looks deep into my eyes, but I can’t tell how much he means what he’s saying. Solemnly, he lifts a finger and places it beneath his eye, keeping it there for a beat.

Our code. I swear it.

I don’t know why it hurts, him swearing that it’d be easy for him to go back to being friends.

“Can you not say the same?” he asks, leaning closer. He’s only a few inches taller than me, but he’s so close he’s bending his neck to look down at me, lowering his face to mine.

My entire body tingles, the way it did during that game of spin the bottle. Except now, I don’t have the excuse of teenage hormones. I’m a grown woman, aching for the man in front of me as he breaks into my space. His nose brushes mine, and my breath hitches. I feel my nerve endings tighten, my nipples going stiff. His question lingers in the air around us.

Can you not say the same?

No. I can’t.

I take a step back. Liam doesn’t move, but the fact that I’ve broken our barest connection changes something, like a shift in the room. I’m off-balance as I collect what’s left of my wits. Then I’m grabbing my coat and my phone, removing it from Liam’s charger, heading to his elevator, and rapidly pressing the button.

I hear him follow me, but then the doors are opening and I’m stepping in. When I turn around, Liam’s right there, holding out my pink sneakers. I blink several times before reaching for them, and I pull them back with me just as the doors close.

My stomach lurches downward with the elevator. Liam wants me to be his fiancée. To pretend to be his fiancée and then pretend our engagement didn’t mean anything.

No, I can’t say it’d be easy for me to go back to being friends.

I certainly can’t swear to it.

* * *

We were eight.

I was the new kid, fresh from Galway, unprepared for the laughter about my accent. Keeping silent wasn’t so hard, but the loneliness of lunch cut deep. The other kids mocked the food I brought from home: ham and cabbage sandwiches and hard-boiled eggs, staples back in Ireland.

By my second week in Chicago, I was throwing away my lunch before I got to school. Hunger pained my stomach, but it was better than humiliation.

Walking home one day, I spotted the glint of a wrapper, a granola bar hidden beneath a bush. Too hungry to think, I crouched down, tore it open, and shoved half into my mouth.

Then I heard boys’ voices around the corner, and I dove into the bushes in panic. Branches scratched through my clothes as I waited for the voices to pass.

It was my next-door neighbors, the O’Sullivan boys. Brady and Finn were walking ahead, arguing loudly. A few steps behind, Liam strode with his head held high, as if the neighborhood belonged to him.

I tightened my grip on my granola bar, accidentally crinkling the wrapper. Liam whipped his head toward me and stopped. After glancing ahead to his brothers, he crouched down.

“Why are you hiding?” he asked quietly.

I showed him my half-eaten granola bar, which wasn’t much of an explanation.

“Liam!” one of his brothers shouted. “Did you find something cool? Is it a dead bird?”

“Just a pinecone,” he called.

“You’re so weird sometimes. Hurry up.” His brothers’ footsteps receded, and Liam pitched his voice low.

“Wait here, okay?” He dashed off before I could nod.