I’m not sure what time it is. It’s after seven o’clock. I know that much. It’s also the first Thursday since I’ve been old enough to sling drinks that I haven’t been behind the bar.

I’m so pissed about it I can barely breathe.

I’m also relieved.

Probably pissed about being relieved.

Who the fuck knows.

Introspection has never been my thing.

All I know is Patrick is right. I have no business being anywhere near Gilroy’s. Or people in general.

I should come with a warning label.

Not fit for human consumption.

I laugh out loud and the sound of my own voice startles me, make me drop the tool in my hand. The sound of it rattling and pinging its way through the undercarriage of the truck I’m working on is loud enough to pull me out of my own head long enough for me to feel the fatigue in my arms. The numbness in my legs. The pinched nerve in my neck. I’ve been standing like this for a while. If I didn’t know better, I’d say I’m exhausted enough to sleep for days. But physical exhaustion has never been my issue. It’s my brain that’s the Energizer Bunny.

It keeps going and going and going and going and—

“Conner.”

I hear her immediately. Her voice cuts through the fog like a knife. Burns a Henley-shaped hole right through the middle of it.

“Fuck my life,” I mutter, my tone low enough not to carry. Pissed and relieved seems to be my new default setting.

“I know you can hear me.”

I ignore her. Stick my hand further into the engine I’m working on to retrieve the wrench I dropped.

She sighs. “Please answer me.”

Yeah, I can hear you but I’m pretty sure you’re a hallucination so answering you tips me from flirting with crazy into full-blown nuts.

“You’re scaring me.”

You and me both, sweetheart.

A couple of quiet seconds pass. Enough to make me think the mirage of her has dissipated. I risk a look up.

She’s still there. Wearing the same thing she had on when she came in to get Tess for lunch this afternoon. Navy pencil skirt. Sky blue silk blouse with pearl buttons. Navy pumps. Her hair caught in a low bun at the nape of her neck. She’s holding a grocery bag.

She looks terrified.

Which is new. Usually, when I see her, she looks happy to see me. She also looks like Henley.

My Henley.

Not the Henley who came back. Perfect hair and perfect skin. Perfect nose and perfect teeth. I don’t know who that person is. To be honest, that person scares me a little because seeing her is tangible proof that the girl I loved is gone. That she’s never coming back. So, yeah—when I imagine her, she looks like my Henley.

Real.

Aiming my gaze at my hands, I redouble my efforts, tightening the bolt I’m working on, quick, hard jerks that threaten to snap it off in my hand.

The next thing I hear is the fast click of her high-heels, clipping across the cement floor, away from me.

She’s leaving.

Shit.

Panic jerks my head up and I stand so fast I slam the back of it into the hood of the truck. “Fuck,” I shout, winging the wrench in my hand at my tool bench. It skips off the brushed metal surface before pinging across the floor.

Exactly what my sleep deprivation needed to keep it company. A goddamned concussion.

She stops walking and turns to look at me. She still looks scared. She also looks concerned. “Are you okay?”

I reach up and touch my fingers to the back of my head, eliciting an immediate hissed curse. “Fine.” Pulling my fingers away, I look down at them, mildly surprised, and not a little bit disappointed, they aren’t covered in gray matter. “At least I don’t have to worry about falling asleep and slipping into a coma.” I say it out loud, laughing at my own joke, too far gone to care about how crazy talking to myself makes me.

She stands there, further away than she was before, watching me like I’m a junkyard dog. Like she’s trying to gauge exactly what kind of reach the chain I’m on gives me. If she’s close enough to catch her if I lunge at her.

“I’m sorry.” I shake my head, a desperation I haven’t felt in years seizing me so hard I feel my heart knock against my ribcage before fluttering its way up my throat. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to yell. Just—don’t leave. Stay and talk to me, okay?” I don’t care if she’s real. I don’t care if I finally boarded the bus to Crazytown. She’s here. She’s with me.

That’s what matters.

It’s the only thing that ever did.

She doesn’t answer me. She just stands there and stares at me. I’m about ready to drop to my knees and beg when she turns away from me again. I watch her use the toe of her Chanel pump to push and kick the lever holding the roll-up garage door open. The hoist chain holding it in place rattle loudly and the door falls, slamming into the concrete in a matter of seconds.

Door closed, she turns to look at me again. “I’m going upstairs,” she says. She doesn’t look afraid anymore. She looks determined. “You can either work yourself to death or you can come with me. It’s up to you.”