“Oh my hell,” Delilah declares, still massaging Dylan’s neck. “You two are fucking adorable.”

The color drains from Nova’s face and she rotates in the seat, looking away from me, and slumping back in the seat. If I didn’t learn about her past, I’d question why she did it, but now that I know, I understand, at least to an extent. I turn around in my seat, crossing my arms over my chest, and the car grows quiet.

Nova starts fiddling with the bands on her wrist that she wears to cover the scar. I lower my hands to my lap and drum my fingers on my knee, remembering how I felt after Lexi’s funeral, even though I’d never made it there. But the idea that she was gone, buried in the ground, made me feel helpless, and I had the intense need to turn everything off. Was that how Nova felt after her boyfriend died?

Without even knowing what I’m doing, I slide my hand across the seat and to Nova’s lap. She flinches from the initial contact and I almost expect her to jerk away. But she remains motionless and I wrap my fingers around her wrist, pressing them against the small, bumpy line on her skin, just below the bands. She rests her head back against the seat, her heart rate quickening, before returning to a steady, consistent beat. The feeling of it calms me down, because it reminds me that there’s life in the world, and that hearts do keep beating even after they break.

Nova

“I can’t believe you bought me these,” I say, staring in disbelief at the pink drums set up in front of me. Landon and I are in my garage, and the door is shut to lock out the icy air, the snow, and the outside world. It’s my birthday and I came out here with him, thinking he was going to drive me somewhere, but instead, there are wonderful, girly drums.

“Do you like them?” he asks, his arms crossed over his chest. He looks really worried, like I’m actually going to hate getting pink drums.

I spread my arms out to the side. “Of course. They’re pink drums.”

A fleeting smile sneaks through, and for a second the brown in his eyes almost looks golden. “Good, because I was worried you wouldn’t.”

I press my hands together, circling around the drums, bouncing with excitement. “Why? You know I’ve always wanted my own set. It gets so annoying using the school’s, especially because all the guys think it’s a guy’s instrument and that I shouldn’t be playing with them.”

“They’re just jealous.” He drops down in a camping chair by the steps. His hair is damp from walking over to my house during the snowstorm, and his cheeks are a little flushed from the cold. He has a black hooded jacket on with the sleeves rolled up, and there’s a ring of murky water around the bottom of his jeans. “Go ahead, Nova Reed, show me what you got.”

I sit down in the stool and pick up the sticks. “But you already know what I’ve got. You’ve heard me play like a thousand times.”

“Yeah, for a crowded room.” He relaxes back in the chair. “But I want you to play just for me.”

I air-jam for a moment. “What do you want me to play?”

He shrugs. “Whatever you want. Make it mean something, though.”

I hate it when he says that, because he’s the kind of person who’s always looking deeper into things than a normal person, like me. I search my brain for the perfect song, but each one has a flaw, is either too fast or too slow, or I can’t play it as good as I want to just yet. Finally I decide just to play my own song, one that I haven’t been able to get out of my head since the day he first kissed me.

“Okay, I have one, but you have to promise not to laugh at me.”

“Why would I laugh?”

“Because I made it up,” I say. “And it’s probably not very good.”

“I’m sure it is,” he assures me. “Besides, I would never laugh at you.” He’s no longer joking, and I love him so much for it. I want to tell him right there that I love him, even though I’ve known for a while, but like always, I chicken out.

Sighing to myself, I elevate the sticks above my head, pretending like I’m going to slam them down and make a lot of noise, but when I touch them to the drums, I hit soft, but with meaning and purpose. I start playing the song, getting more into it the longer I play. At one point I shut my eyes and let my hands lead the way, getting lost in the beat, getting swept away to another world while I think up lyrics in my head and whisper them under my breath. If I didn’t know any better, I’d swear I’d died for a moment and left my body peacefully.

But then the song ends, and the moment of peace floats away and is replaced by nervousness. I open my eyes and realize that the camping chair is empty. I glance to my left and then my right, panicking when I don’t see him anywhere.

“Was I that bad?” I wonder aloud, frowning at the sticks in my hand.

“No, it was perfect.” The sound of his voice right over my shoulder causes me to jump.

I spin around in the chair, dropping the drumsticks, and pressing my hand over my racing heart. “Shit, you scared me.”

He doesn’t laugh at me, nor does he smile. He simply studies me with a perplexed, somewhat astonished look. “That was beautiful,” he conclusively says and traces his fingers across my cheekbone. “Happy birthday, Nova,” he whispers.

My eyelids flutter shut as his hand travels down my jawline, to my neck, to the collar of my shirt. He tugs it down a little and slips his fingers inside my bra as he lays me back against the drums. My head bumps against the cymbal, but I’m too consumed by his thumb grazing my nipple to care about the ringing in my ears.

He moves his mouth toward mine. “Nova… I…” He struggles to say something and I force my eyelids open, despite my body’s protest. Our gazes lock, and for a second I think he’s going to break up with me because he looks terrified and conflicted and completely torn apart on the inside.

“I love you,” he whispers.

I swear to God time stops.

“I love you, too,” I say with zero hesitation.

He starts to smile but it quickly fades, and then his lips connect with mine. He kisses me, caresses my body, drinks me in until my head becomes so cloudy I can barely remember my name. It’s the perfect birthday. One I know I’ll remember forever, because the guy I want to be with forever finally said he loves me.

When I open my eyes, the car has stopped moving, and I’m lying in the backseat with a piece of paper on my forehead. Blinking away the disorientation, I sit up and take the note off my head.

Dear Sleepyhead,

Once you wake your lazy ass up, meet us out in the tent area.

Delilah

Shaking my head, I ball the note up and stuff it away in my pocket. The car is parked at the outskirts of a dirt field that’s packed with people flocking toward a massive stage set up near the forest line. There are drums and amps and every other musical instrument that my heart secretly desires to play set up on it, along with lights strung along the front. The sun is intoxicatingly warm, and it makes the leather seats below me hot and the backs of my legs sticky. There’s no one else inside the car with me and the doors are locked. There are already so many things wrong with being here, like the sight of the drums up onstage, the fact that I missed counting as the sun came up, and the fact that I’m waking up in the backseat of a car I’ve only rode in once. So much unfamiliarity and my heart is already speeding up, slamming against my chest in unnerving thumps, and I start to take deeper breaths as I veer towards hyperventilation. I don’t know what’s about to happen next, whether I’ll lose control, think of Landon too much, panic and do something irrational.

There’s only one thing that can maybe get me back on track. I take out my cell phone and open the file, the sight of it slightly settling my heart rate, and gradually my breathing returns to normal. The longer I look at it, the more at peace I become, and again I have the urge to open it, my mind whispering at me that if I do I can see him again. Get an understanding. I don’t, though, and once the five minutes pass I turn off my phone since the battery is half dead.

Scooting to the edge of the seat, I tuck the phone into my pocket, work the lock up, and climb out of the car. I stretch my legs and then tug the elastic from my hair, combing my fingers through the tangles as I start the hike across the field. The atmosphere is lively and buzzing with excitement, and I start counting my steps as I turn to the side and weave my way around groups of people smoking cigarettes and drinking beers. I have no idea where the tent area is or if there’s even such a thing as a tent area.

Forty-eight… forty-nine… fifty…

My head is hurting. The air is spicy and sticky and smells like sweat, cigarettes, and weed. I pause in a small gap in the crowd, turning in a circle, trying to get my bearings.

Fifty-seven… fifty-eight… fifty-nine…

My heart throbs, and I place my hand on my forehead, trying to spot something familiar. The atmosphere is already getting to be too much, and I’ve been out of the car for a whole three minutes. This is exactly what I was afraid of. I knew I’d get like this, be overwhelmed by people and the fact that I have no idea what’s about to happen in the next second. My mind starts to race and dash toward thoughts of Landon and me at concerts, listening, singing along, kissing…

“Hey.” The sound of Quinton’s voice blankets around me and puts a stop to my mental counting insanity. It’s the most amazing thing I’ve ever experienced, and I want to grab on to it with everything I have in me.

When his hands graze my hips, my body settles even more and a strange quietness surfaces in me, one that I’ve only been able to get through weed. My hand falls from my head as I turn around and angle my neck to look at him. There are red rings around his eyes, not from being stoned but from exhaustion, and a few strands of his brown hair are sticking out on the side of his head. He has a half-finished beer in his hand, and a pack of cigarettes are poking out of the front pocket of his T-shirt.

“You look tired,” I call out over the voices of the people around us.

“I’m fucking exhausted,” he admits, leaning in toward my ear. His breath smells like beer. He tucks a strand of my hair behind my ear. “I don’t like car rides… And I can’t sleep when I’m in a car.”

I put my lips beside his ear, trying not to breathe in his scent, but it’s impossible. “You should go take a nap or something, then.”

Shaking his head, he steps back and motions around us. “And miss all this fun?”

I frown at the crowd as I refasten my hair into a secure ponytail, leaving a few strands loose to frame my face. I reach for the cherry ChapStick I carry in my back pocket. “It’s really noisy,” I comment and move the stick over my lips. He watches me through hooded eyes, but I’m going to blame it on the sun.

“It’s a concert, Nova.” His tongue slips out of his mouth to wet his lips, and then he tips his head back and takes a sip of the beer, his neck muscles moving as he swallows. “It’s supposed to be full of noise and chaos.”