Episode 5

Valentine's Day at Northlake was not a holiday.

It was a public audit of who had been chosen.

By six in the evening, every dorm lobby smelled like roses and sugar. Girls carried bouquets wrapped in gold paper. Guys crossed campus with stuffed bears tucked under one arm and the panicked look of men who had waited too long to learn their girlfriend's favorite candy.

I had planned to ignore all of it.

Then the King family group chat betrayed me.

Mom: Julian sent flowers to the club dinner tonight. Very tasteful.

Victor: His new girlfriend is from a strong family. Good match.

Noah: He bought her that bracelet Renee wanted last year lol awkward.

Noah: WAIT I DID NOT MEAN LOL.

Noah: Renee don't murder me.

I stared at the messages until the words stopped being words.

Julian Chase had not broken my heart in some epic, cinematic way. He had done it politely. He had smiled at donor dinners, called me intense when I asked where he had been, and moved on to a girl whose family name looked better beside his on invitations. The bracelet was not the point.

The point was that everyone back home still discussed his life as if mine were a footnote in it.

Harper found me sitting cross-legged on my bed with my phone face down.

"Please tell me you are not doom-scrolling rich people."

"I'm doom-existing adjacent to them."

"Terrible hobby." She tossed a pillow at me. "Come to the convenience store. I need sour candy, and you need to stop looking like a Victorian ghost."

"Do Victorian ghosts buy snacks?"

"The hot ones do."

So I went.

The store was warm, narrow, and packed with students buying last-minute flowers from plastic buckets by the register. I picked up a bottle of water, a pack of gum, and, because I was apparently committed to emotional self-harm, a small bar of mint chocolate.

Julian had hated mint chocolate.

Said it tasted like toothpaste trying to be dessert.

I bought it anyway.

Outside, the air had sharpened after sunset. Harper had stayed behind to argue with the cashier about whether a heart-shaped lollipop counted as sour candy, so I stepped onto the sidewalk alone and checked Noah's latest apology text.

Noah: For real though, sorry about the bracelet comment.

Noah: Also I got a B on calculus. So don't tell Mom yet?

Despite myself, I smiled.

"Renee, right?"

I looked up.

A guy from my intro media class stood near the bike rack, hands in his jacket pockets. I had forgotten his name twice and rejected his coffee invitation once.

"Hey," I said carefully. "I need to get back."

He moved with me when I tried to step around him. "You always in a hurry?"

"Usually when I'm leaving."

He laughed like I had flirted. "Come on. It's Valentine's Day. You could be nicer."

The smile fell off my face. "Move."

"I just want to talk."

"I don't."

He glanced toward the store window, where Harper was still at the register. "You have a boyfriend or something?"

"I don't need one to say no."

His expression changed. Not anger exactly. Embarrassment looking for somewhere to go.

"You think you're too good for people," he said.

I tightened my grip on the plastic bag. "No. I think you're standing in my way."

He stepped closer.

Before I could decide whether to shove him or scream Harper's name, another voice cut through the cold.

"She told you to move."

Landon Dalton stood at the edge of the sidewalk, one hand still on the open door of a black SUV idling by the curb.

For half a second, the whole world did the embarrassing thing where it rearranged around him.

The guy from class straightened. "This isn't your business."

Landon shut the car door.

He did not raise his voice. He did not touch me. He did not even look at me first.

He looked at the guy.

"You made it my business when she had to say no twice."

"We were just talking."

"No," Landon said. "You were blocking her."

The guy's face reddened. A couple of students slowed near the curb, sensing drama the way Northlake students sensed free pizza.

I hated that people were watching.

I hated more that I felt safer with Landon there.

"Apologize," Landon said.

The guy barked a laugh. "Seriously?"

Landon stepped closer. Not enough to threaten. Enough to make the space change.

"Seriously."

The guy looked at me, then away. "Sorry."

"To her," Landon said.

My heart kicked once, hard.

The guy swallowed. "Sorry, Renee."

"Accepted," I said, because I wanted the scene over. "Now leave."

He left.

The little audience dissolved with disappointed whispers.

Landon finally turned to me. The store light caught the edge of his face, softening nothing. He looked as controlled as he had outside the stadium, but there was something different in his eyes now. Less accusation. More irritation on my behalf.

"You okay?" he asked.

"Yes."

"Did he touch you?"

"No."

His jaw flexed anyway.

I should have said thank you and gone inside. I should have remembered the returned envelope, the warning, the way his teammates had laughed at my coat.

Instead, I said, "You didn't have to do that."

"I know."

That stopped me.

He glanced at the store. "Your friend is coming."

Harper burst through the door two seconds later, sour candy in one hand, eyes narrowed at Landon like she was deciding whether to bite him. "Problem?"

"Handled," I said.

"By him?"

"Temporarily confusing, yes."

Landon's mouth almost moved.

That almost-smile was going to become a problem if I let it.

Harper looked between us. "Renee?"

"I'm fine."

Landon stepped back, giving me a clean path to leave. That mattered. I did not want it to matter, but it did.

"Don't walk alone tonight," he said.

"That's not an order."

"No." His eyes held mine. "It's a request."

The cold seemed to slip under my coat.

For one reckless second, I wanted to give him something. Not forgiveness. Not trust. Just acknowledgment that he had done the right thing when he could have kept driving.

My hand moved inside the plastic bag and found the mint chocolate.

I pulled it halfway out.

Then a girl's voice rang from the SUV.

"Landon, are we going or not?"

I looked past him.

Caroline Vale leaned from the open window, pretty and impatient in a white sweater, one glossy curl falling over her shoulder.

Of course.

My fingers closed around the chocolate until the wrapper crackled.

Landon glanced back. "One minute."

"No need," I said.

His attention returned to me. "Renee...

"Thanks for helping."