Chapter 2

My face said it all. Was Brett being serious?

He was the one who'd suddenly laid it all out that day, telling me he didn't like how I was always clinging to him, relying on him for everything. He was the one who'd tossed me some random AI app out of nowhere.

"Why would I need to tell you?" I asked.

Brett didn't have a comeback for that, and his expression darkened. "Would your parents really be okay with you going alone?"

For some reason, the AI on my phone popped into my head.

"Who said I'm going alone?"

Brett scoffed. "I know you better than anyone. You can't even go to the convenience store downstairs without me tagging along. Who else would go with you? Even if your parents are fine with it, my mom would still—"

Before he could finish, his phone rang. It was his mother, Sally Gilbert.

My hearing wasn't great, and even with my hearing aids, I couldn't make out what they were saying. But watching Brett's expression grow more and more irritated, I could guess that Sally was telling him to go to Briar Island with me.

He could have said no. But after he hung up, he let out a long sigh. "I really can't get rid of you, can I?"

I stood there, frozen.

I understood why his mother did it. When I was little, my hearing problems hadn't been as bad. One day, Brett had been acting like a brat and grabbed a toy horn, screaming my name right into my ear.

I'd clapped my hands over my ears and burst into tears. My parents had rushed me to the hospital, and the results hadn't been good. I would probably need hearing aids for the rest of my life just to function normally.

My parents hadn't said much about it, but Sally had been furious. She'd beat Brett within an inch of his life and made him kneel in front of me and swear an oath.

"Brett Carver swears he'll take care of Mara Kessler forever, be good to her, and never bully her again."

Little Brett cried so hard his shoulders shook. He'd been too young to understand what responsibility even meant. But to everyone's surprise, he'd actually kept that promise.

From the time we were six until we were 18, he was the one I leaned on. He was the kind of person who understood what I meant without me having to say a word.

So I'd always known that Brett had probably started to develop feelings for Tiana.

It was around three months before graduation, I think. Tiana, the class slacker who was always dead last in the rankings, had suddenly started studying.

Brett had been dismissive. He'd peeled an egg for me while muttering under his breath. "So she's done messing around, and now she regrets it. Does she really think three months can make up for three years of everyone else's hard work? I can't stand people like that."

He really had disliked Tiana because she was always late, always skipping class, always causing disruptions. But that changed the day he ran into her on a stairwell landing.

The practice exams she'd been carrying tumbled out of her arms and scattered across the floor, and Brett saw the pages covered edge to edge in handwritten notes.

From that day on, he started getting closer to her. A month before graduation, he pulled Tiana into our study group to help her pass. And he started overlooking me.

So it made sense that he wanted to draw a line between us.

I thought about it for a moment and took a deep breath. "You don't have to come. I'll smooth things over with your mom for you."

Brett gave a bitter half-smile and pulled a plane ticket out of his pocket. Then he turned to Tiana. "I was on the fence about going with you, but now it looks like I don't have a choice."

They looked at each other and smiled.

I quietly opened my AI app. "I think I just became a prop in their little game."

"That's rough."