Page 185 of Cross Checked
Aura folded into us from the front, and for a second we were just a tangle of limbs and tears and perfume and college-girl grief on a couch that had seen more breakdowns than any piece of furniture should be legally required to witness.
When Charm finally pulled back, she cupped my face in both hands, thumbs brushing under my eyes with dramatic tenderness. “Then that’s a Never.”
My breath caught.
“No.”
“Yes,” Aura said immediately.
I looked at her. Her face was steady, even with tears in her eyes. “He is what your Nevers are supposed to be. Your way of sharing your life with your mom in your weird Bliss way, beautiful and tragic all at once.”
My chest squeezed so hard it hurt.
“The Nevers were never supposed to belong to Luke,” Charm said. “They started because you loved your mom and wanted to honor all the things you couldn’t share with her. He took up too much space in them, but he doesn’t get to keep them.”
Charm nodded, her own tears spilling now. “You’re finally at a place where you can add good back in, B. Cade deserves a Never because he’s one of the things you would tell her about. One of the beautiful things. That was the whole point before everything got so ugly and you were adding Nevers because of pain.”
I stared at them, and something inside me shifted, not healed or fixed, but turned toward the light.
A tiny reckless moth throwing itself at warmth because the alternative was staying frozen forever.
“I need to buy a Never,” I whispered.
Charm shot to her feet so fast she almost knocked over the coffee table. “Mall emergency.”
Aura wiped her face and stood too. “Trinkets and Things?”
I nodded, and the tears turned into the strangest laugh because for the first time all day, the fear in my chest was not bigger than the want. “Trinkets and Things.”
Charm clapped once. “Perfect. We’re getting you a Cade marble, then we’re getting you dressed like the main character of a country song where you call your mom and tell her about the boy.”
I laughed through the ache in my throat. “A Tennessee Orange moment?”
“Exactly,” Charm said. “Except pink, black, and emotionally dangerous.”
Aura’s mouth curved. “Very on brand.”
And somehow, an hour later, I was standing inside Trinkets and Things beneath warm pendant lights and hanging glass ornaments, staring down at a velvet tray of handblown marbles like my entire future had been narrowed to one impossible choice.
The shop smelled like cinnamon, old wood, and the kind of floral candle that made every mall boutique feel like somebody’s aunt had strong opinions about throw pillows. Shelves crowded around us with crystals, tiny figurines, wind chimes, weird ceramic frogs, handmade jewelry, and enough trinkets to financially endanger Charm if Aura stopped supervising. The front window reflected the three of us standing shoulder to shoulder, my eyes still a little swollen, Charm vibrating with purpose, Aura quiet and watchful beside me.
I saw it almost immediately.
A small crystalline blue marble sat near the back of the tray, half-hidden between a green swirl and a deep purple one flecked with gold. It was not the biggest. Not the flashiest. Not even the weirdest, which usually mattered to me because I was the marble girl and I respected drama in all artistic mediums.
But the second the woman behind the counter placed it in my palm, I knew.
It was Cade.
Not literally, because that would be creepy and possibly grounds for an intervention, but the glass held the same impossible blue as his eyes when he looked at me in the dark and told me the truth whether I was ready for it or not. Icy at first glance, almost sharp, but when I tilted it beneath the light, silver threaded through the center and turned the whole thing bright.
Cold until it wasn’t and beautiful either way.
“Oh,” Charm whispered.
Aura’s hand found my back. “That’s the one.”
I curled my fingers around it, and for something so small, it felt like one of the biggest things I had ever bought.
