Chapter 3
The first time I saw him, I knew.
Not logically.
Not rationally.
Not in any way I could explain to another person without sounding unwell.
But I knew.
It was the first big lecture of the semester, the kind where every seat in the auditorium disappeared before class even started. I hurried in clutching my notebook, scanned the room, and found one strange little island near the back by the window.
One boy sat there alone.
Not because the room was empty.
Because the seats around him were.
Deliberately.
Like there was an invisible caution line nobody wanted to cross.
He was wearing a plain white shirt with the sleeves rolled to his forearms. His back was straight, almost unnaturally straight, and his head was slightly lowered as if the noise around him had nothing to do with him at all.
Even in a crowded room, he looked paused.
Muted.
Like the world had reached for him and he had stepped half an inch out of its grasp.
I started toward him.
A nice-looking guy in the aisle tried to stop me.
“You can sit here,” he offered, a little awkwardly. “That seat next to him is… uh… people usually don’t.”
At the sound of our voices, the boy by the window looked up.
Our eyes met.
And the whole world gave a tiny, violent lurch.
His eyes were light brown. Beautiful. Frightened. Unbelievably familiar.
I smiled at the guy who had offered me a seat. “Thanks. I’m looking for him.”
Then I walked right over and sat down.
The noise in the room dipped for half a second.
I ignored it.
I turned to him and lowered my voice like I was sharing a secret.
“Hudson?”
For a moment he just stared at me.
Then, finally, he made a tiny sound.
“Mm.”
His voice was low and rough, like it had been dragged over something sharp on the way out.
My heart practically burst.
I hooked my pinky around his and grinned. “I knew it was you. I recognized you right away. Isn’t that kind of amazing?”
He did not answer.
But the tips of his ears turned red.
Then redder.
Then so red I panicked and let go before he combusted in front of me.
The second I pulled away, he looked at me with such naked alarm that I instantly shoved my hand back into his.
“There,” I whispered. “Much better.”
Then, because I had waited three years for this moment and apparently my sense of timing had left my body, I asked cheerfully, “So what’s your real name?”
He froze.
I tilted my head.
“Hudson isn’t your real name, right? You promised that when we met in person, you’d tell me.”
When we first started talking online, neither of us had used our real names. It had started as a joke. Screen names, fake names, nonsense names. Then the habit stuck.
He swallowed hard.
Then, with enormous effort, he said, “Adrian.”
I smiled and gently shook our linked hands.
“Adrian,” I repeated. “Hi. I’m Chloe. It’s really, really nice to finally meet you.”
If joy could have killed me, I would have died right there in that ugly lecture hall seat.
I did not know, not then, that the boy beside me was only half of the story.