Page 9 of The Lost Guardian

The necklace is the key… The stories were true. Santiago felt weak, like his muscles were stuck in concrete. He could barely keep his head up, so he didn’t. He only tucked his chin to his chest and began to cry.

It wasn’t until he heard Brooke’s car pull up to his driveway with the cheerful beep beep of her horn that he came back to himself.

As he slowly lifted himself from sitting, he realized he was chilled, the sweat having dried on his body. How long had he been sitting there?

Santiago carefully folded up the letter, taking out his wallet to tuck it inside. Then, he slipped on the necklace. The stone was warm from his grip, contrasting sharply with his freezing skin.

On a fortifying breath, he opened his front door.

“Santi!” a delighted voice cried out before something small but forceful slammed against him, knocking the air from his lungs.

“Hey, River,” he managed to gasp, mussing up the top of her hair.

She pulled back, wrinkling her nose. “Eww, you’re all sweaty.”

“Climbing,” he mumbled, keeping his voice low so as not to betray the emotion inside it. “Let me shower and change.”

Thankfully, Brooke was much shorter than he was, so he didn’t betray his watery gaze. Though he knew he’d eventually need to talk about it, he wasn’t ready yet.

Instead of waiting in the living room like a normal person, Brooke followed Santiago to his room, sprawling atop his bed as he ducked into the bathroom. The clack of the lock reverberated around the tiny, tiled space.

“Afraid for your virtue?” Brooke called from behind the door.

“Nope, I just don’t trust you,” he shot back, slipping out of his clothing. Not after last time.

“Just one photo, Santi!” Brooke cackled. “Just one shirtless pic for your profile. People need to know there’s a Latin Superman body under that nerdy professor disguise!”

“Some people think professors are sexy,” Santiago argued, not bothering to tell her that he’d long since deleted the dating app she put on his phone.

“Not the way you dress,” he heard Brooke say before he turned on the shower faucet and her voice was drowned out by the water.

Despite her less than flattering words, Santiago couldn’t help but smile. It had been an awful day, but at least he had his best friend to distract him from his troubles.

Santiago had first met Brooke in the eighth grade, when her family had moved to California from somewhere cold and bitter on the East Coast. She walked straight up to Santiago, the only person eating lunch alone in their middle school cafeteria, and struck a deal.

“My name is Brooke,” she’d said, placing her black-and-purple lunch box on the table and plopping down across from him. “I like girls,” she continued. “Only girls. So if you promise not to get a crush on me, we can be friends.”

Santiago nodded furiously, mouth full to the brim with peanut butter and jelly—the most “American” lunch his parents could think of. To this day, just the thought of peanut butter made him queasy.

“I promise,” he said once he could speak, and they had quickly become inseparable.

Of course, he had broken his promise almost immediately. It was difficult not to like Brooke. She was all long-limbed and golden-skinned and sunshine hair. She was funny and assertive and knew exactly who she was. Unlike Santiago.

At the time, he had found it horribly unfair that he would never have a chance with her, his adolescent brain convinced that they were destined to be together forever.

Thankfully, the feeling faded almost as quickly as it began. The best part about the whole ordeal was that he wasn’t wrong. Brooke and Santi were meant to be together forever, and she had been his best friend ever since.

Even when Santiago had skipped a grade—and then another—and they no longer had classes together, they would find each other for lunch. When he graduated and took the bus to and from his college classes, they found the time for study parties, movie nights, and phone calls.

Santiago never told Brooke of his momentary tweenage crush, but he suspected that she knew anyway. He was grateful that she had waited it out. They balanced each other, and they had both grown into better people for it.

He shook his head, remembering the time that she had convinced him to take her to a frat party at seventeen—one they were promptly kicked out of—as he wrapped his towel around his waist and peeked out the bathroom door. Brooke was no longer in the room.

He stepped out, a hot rush of air escaping into the bedroom with him. He turned around, catching his reflection in the mirror, and his eyes snagged on the chakana pendant.

Santiago wrestled the monster of his grief back down. He knew the feeling too well to give in to it right now. He might lose himself—again—if he did. He also knew that burying the sadness wouldn’t fix it, of course.

But he was only human.