I rubbed at my chest like I could smooth out the ache there. “Part of me wishes hewouldfight for me. But I get it. No one wants to throw themselves into a war if they’re not sure they’ll be welcome when the dust clears.”
And that was it, wasn’t it? The heart of all of this. Wanting to be chosen, but also needing to choose. Wanting clarity, when all I had was chaos.
“If I’m being honest,” I added quietly, “I really like him. I do. He’s easy to be with. It’s fun and uncomplicated.” Then I exhaled and looked down at my hands. “But I don’t know if that’s enough. Because the truth is—” I hesitated. “My lips are still tingling from Coop’s kiss. And the rest of you? You’re tying me up in knots.”
The silence that followed was thick.
That feeling?
Yeah. Stilldeeplyconflicted.
“You’ve all invited me,” I said, finally glancing around the table. “I haven’t forgotten that. I swear.”
They were watching me like I was a live wire. Like one wrong move might burn the whole night down.
“I just…” I licked my lips. “I don’t want to say yes to one of you and make the others feel like they don’t matter. I don’t want to be that girl who turns something real into a contest.”
“So what girldoyou want to be?” Bubba asked, voice gentler than I expected.
“I don’t know yet,” I admitted. “But Idoknow I want to go to Homecoming.”
The truth slid into the air like a weight, solid and real.
“And… I kind of want to go withallof you.”
I didn’t look at them right away—didn’tdare. But when I finally raised my eyes, the table was frozen like someone had hit pause on the universe. No one moved. No one breathed.
And that’s when I realized—I hadn’t just dropped a bomb.
I’d lit the fuse.
Chapter
Thirty-Seven
ARCHIE
The room was silent, but it was a silence so loud it was deafening. Frankie's words hung in the air like a challenge, a dare, and a plea all rolled into one. Tension radiated off each of my friends, and they had to be wrestling with the same thoughts I was. How do we make this work? How could we not screw this up?
I looked at Frankie, and for a moment, I saw the vulnerability in her eyes. She wasn’t just asking us to take her to Homecoming. She was asking us to be okay with sharing her. It was a big ask.
While none of us expected this, here we were. I couldn’t help but feel a strange mix of excitement and trepidation. Agreeing to share her now didn’t mean a permanent state. It was a door that I’d leaned on for years finally opening.
"Frankie," I said, my voice steady despite the turmoil inside me. "You know we'd do anything for you, right?"
She nodded, a small, almost hesitant movement.
"Then let's figure this out," I continued. "Together. Because if you want to go to Homecoming with all of us, then that's what we'll do. But we need to be clear about what that means."
I glanced at Jake, Bubba, and Coop, each of them nodding in agreement. They were on board, but I could see the questions in their eyes. They were wondering, just like I was, how we did make this work without hurting each other or Frankie.
Jake, though, he looked away, a flicker of something—resentment? jealousy?—crossing his face. I couldn’t blame him. He’d made his bed at the party and gotten himself tossed. It wasn’t going to be easy on him.
Oh well.
"Okay," Frankie said, her voice a little stronger now. "So, what does that mean? How do we do this?"
I leaned back in my chair, trying to gather my thoughts. "It means we need to talk. Really talk. About what we want, what we're willing to do, and what we're not. It means we need to be honest with each other, even if it's hard."
