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“I’m serious. We’ll figure it out. You’re not going anywhere you don’t want to go, Tess. We won’t let you.”

Something lands in me, very quietly. I have places. Not one. Several. A floor in Hargrove. A room on Wren Street that might get extended. Two girls on a porch who just told me without me asking that they’d figure it out.

I write it down later in my notebook. Options. And under it, I make a list.

Rafe drives up Friday to get me. We’re at his parents’ house now. We have enough sex to last weeks for the first three days. He takes me on his couch, the rug, on his bed, and the shower.

He’s inside of me when he says, “Flight’s are on Thursday.”

I don’t even know what he means. “What flight?”

“Ours.”

I look up, and he kisses me.

He drives into me until we both come. He pulls out and cleans me.

“Thursday morning,” he says. “Seven-forty. We get in at ten. Hotel’s across from the arena. Mom and Dad are flying Wednesday because my dad wants to walk the building.” He makes a face. “Sato’s there Wednesday, too. The draft’s Friday night, first round. Second and third are Saturday.” He keeps scrolling. “You’re coming.”

I’m sitting bare on his bed and raise an eyebrow at him.

He grins at me, and I watch him hear it. “Please, baby.”

I blink because I didn’t think I’d ever hear those pleading words from his mouth while he stands naked after sex.

“Do you want to come?” he asks. “Say yes.”

And I almost laugh because I can see it on his face how much he wants me there. I squeeze my legs together.

Last August, he stood on a stairwell landing and told me to withdraw my Woodbury application. Now he’s sitting in his desk chair asking me if I want to watch him get drafted.

My––have the roles changed.

“Of course, I want to come,” I say.

His dark eyes look down my body. “Good. You’re in the aisle seat. I don’t fit in the aisle.”

“You already bought the ticket?” I scoff.

He shrugs. “You’re mine.”

My heart stills, and all the air leaves my lungs. His.

I am his.

Dinner is on the back patio because it’s warm enough now. The whole time it’s about the draft. It’s impossible for it to be anything else. His mom wants to know about the suit, which got fitted on Thursday. His dad has a folder with tabs. It has the flights, the hotel, and a map of the arena he printed off a website with the doors circled.

I watch Mr. Waleska open the folder, look at it, and then look up at his son across the table.

“What time do you want to leave for the arena on Friday?” he says.

Not we’re leaving at four. Not the car will be downstairs at four.

What time do you want.

Rafe looks at him for a second, like he heard it, too.

“Five,” Rafe says. “Sato says the first round doesn’t start till seven, and I don’t want to sit there for hours.”