Tuesday, July 5

PRAGUE

It was past sunset when Aubrey got up. Despite the open window and the fan in the corner, the air felt humid. Claustrophobic. She looked outside at the shapes of opulent rooftops and down to the street, where a group of people stood drinking and talking.

Rae and Clara had been gone for a while, and Aubrey didn’t want to be here when they got back. She needed to get out—out of this hostel and out of this room, where every cinder-block wall had been painted in layers of thick blue paint. It made her feel like she was having a fever dream.

She went to the mirror and looked at her wrinkled clothes and blotchy red cheeks. She wiped away the mascara printed under her eyes and tugged out the tangles in her hair. For once, she didn’t care about combing it or parting it in the exact right place. She didn’t care that she was alone or that Jonah was probably halfway back to—wherever by now. He’d only said that he was going, not where he was going to. And every time she tried to picture him in any particular place, she couldn’t. She imagined him hopping from train to train instead, losing himself in city after city.

But Aubrey couldn’t obsess over that. She needed to think about tonight. She needed to learn how to be by herself.

How to be a grown-up.

She grabbed her room key and opened the door—right onto Gabe.

His hand was raised like he was about to knock, but he dropped it by his side instead. “Hi,” he said.

“Hi.” Aubrey’s breath felt trapped inside her rib cage.

Gabe scratched the side of his head. On his wrists, he wore a few old festival bracelets, and he’d changed into this old Brown University T-shirt he used to wear a lot after he’d first moved from Rhode Island. The pale blue material was almost threadbare at the collar, and for a few light-headed seconds, Aubrey imagined what it would feel like against her skin. But she shook the thought away.

“So,” he said. “Should we talk? Because I want to tell you how sorry—”

She held up her hand to stop him. “Don’t. I really can’t talk about this right now.”

“Okay.” He paused. “Are you going out?”

She stepped into the hallway and pulled the door shut behind her. It locked automatically. “I think so.”

“You think so? You mean you’re still deciding?”

“No. I’ve decided. But—I don’t know where.” They walked into the stairwell, a light jittering to life above them. They’d been in Prague for a few hours, and Aubrey wondered what Gabe had been doing all this time—sitting alone in his hostel room, maybe. Unpacking his stuff, checking his phone, and feeling complete disbelief that his best friend wasn’t there with him.

“What you’re telling me,” Gabe said, as they went down a flight of concrete steps, “is that you don’t have a plan?”

“It’s Prague. I’ll figure something out.”

“Yeah, but, Bryce. You always have a plan.”

“I do not. At least not anymore.”

Aubrey maneuvered around a girl carrying a basket of clean laundry and skipped out the front door. The same group of people she’d seen from her window was still there, having a loud conversation in English. Aubrey stepped over an old soda bottle someone had left on the stoop and walked up to a guy with his hair in a ponytail. Her resolve wavered, but she refused to let anxiety win. She tapped him on the shoulder.

“Hey?” There was a question in his voice, like he was trying to figure out if he knew her.

“Are all of you staying here?” she asked, pointing back at the hostel.

“Yeah,” the guy said. “You?”

Aubrey nodded.

A girl with a nose hoop turned around, too. “We’re going to a bar,” she said. “You two should totally come with!”

“Us two?” Aubrey checked over her shoulder and saw Gabe, hands casually slung in the pockets of his jeans. “You’re coming as well?”

He shrugged. “I don’t have anywhere else to be.”

Aubrey bit down on her tongue. On the one hand, this was something she’d wanted to do alone. She’d wanted to be bold, to play the part of the girl she would have to become as soon as she got to New York. And also—he was Gabe! A few hours ago, they’d kissed. A few hours ago, Jonah had left because of that kiss.

But on the other hand—he was Gabe. Gabe, who’d spent long afternoons reading on the sofa in her living room. Gabe, who made her feel comfortable. Who made her feel safe.

Maybe it was better having him with her.

The streets of Prague were a maze, and Aubrey was too on edge to keep track of any of them. She and Gabe followed the rest of the group to a bar sandwiched between a currency exchange and a store with a display of marionettes in the window. Their strings glinted like spiderwebs, and their painted eyes stared blankly outside.

“Creepy,” Gabe said to Aubrey.

“No kidding,” Aubrey said. “It’s like they know all my secrets.”

“Aubrey,” he said in a creaky voice. “Aubrey, I know about that bio test you never studied for.”

She elbowed him in the stomach.

Inside, the bar was warm and rustic, with farmhouse tables, wagon wheels suspended from the ceiling, and vintage advertisements hanging on the walls. Their group gathered in the center, but Aubrey headed straight for the bar, where a bartender with a shaved head stood cleaning pint glasses. Aubrey asked him for a beer, clutching her passport to her chest, expecting him to check her ID.

But he didn’t. He filled a heavy tankard and handed it over.

“That was fast,” Gabe said, walking up next to her.

Aubrey lifted her drink. “Cheers.”

“Hold that thought. I need one, too.” He ordered a beer as well, then folded his arms on the counter. She thought, I really like his hair that way, all long and messy on top. And she liked his Brown T-shirt, because it was nerdy and it reminded her of when they’d first started hanging out. And she liked that if she’d asked him right then, he probably could have told her the name of the song playing over the bar’s speakers.

“I’m really glad you came along,” she said, tightly gripping her cold glass.

A spark of hope flashed in his eyes. “You are?”

“Sorry,” a guy from the hostel group said, squeezing through the crowd to reach the bar. He had spiky dark hair and sounded American, but he ordered his drink in Czech. “I’m Henry, by the way,” he said, turning to Gabe and Aubrey after he’d paid. “So you guys go to Brown?”

Gabe glanced down at his shirt. “No,” he said at the same time that Aubrey said, “Yes.”

Henry glanced between them. “You do or you don’t?”

“We do.” Aubrey tapped her foot against Gabe’s. She wanted him to understand—tonight, she wasn’t High School Aubrey. She wasn’t the bored, childish girl she’d been at the Amsterdam party.

“Yeah,” Gabe said. “We’re—uh—we’re going to be sophomores.”

Henry’s brow pinched. “But you said you didn’t go there?”

“What can I tell you?” Gabe shot Aubrey a look. “I’m full of contradictions.”

Henry nodded wisely. “That only gets more true, man. I just finished my junior year at Northwestern.”

“That’s such a great school,” Aubrey said.

“It’s all right,” he said. “But I’m not sure I’ll go back. I’m actually taking a little time off.”

“And that’s allowed?” Gabe asked.

“Sure. College is a lot of pressure. Sometimes you have to step back, examine things from a new angle. I’m traveling this summer, and then I’m going to WWOOF in Italy.”

“Woof?” Aubrey asked.

“Yup. You live on a farm for a while, volunteer there. A buddy of mine did it a couple semesters ago—picked crops, baked his own bread, shit like that. Said it made him realize there was more to life than just studying crap.” Henry pointed at them. “Don’t forget that.”

Gabe smirked. “You should definitely talk to my parents.”

“And mine,” Aubrey chimed in. Henry was saying something else, but she stopped listening for a moment. She was thinking over what Lucy had said the day they’d left London—that it was good for her to take this time, that she needed to travel and be aimless before making the decisions that would define the rest of her life. But Aubrey had assumed she didn’t need that kind of time. She’d assumed she’d made those decisions already.

More people congregated around the bar. Aubrey couldn’t hear the music as well, but she could feel it—persistent, sad, weary. It was a strange contrast to the buzz she felt at her future opening up, at seeing all these new possibilities she’d never even known about.

And the most exciting part was, tonight held those possibilities, too.

Aubrey put her empty glass down on a paper coaster. She was two beers in and sitting with Gabe at a table now, with Henry across from them talking to the girl with the nose hoop. He and Nose Hoop Girl seemed to be hitting it off, actually. Aubrey wondered if they would kiss.

“Okay.” Gabe showed her the mouthful of amber liquid at the bottom of his own glass. “Your turn.”

They’d been playing a game to pass the time: Whoever finished their drink first had to make a prediction about the other’s future—and that person had to accept it. No questions asked.

“Easy,” Aubrey said. “Next year, when it’s cold and raining in Oregon, and you’ve had enough of hipsters and trees, you’re going to look up pictures of all these other places in the world and realize that Portland is exactly the right one for you. And you’ll be so happy, because in your whole life, you won’t have one single regret. That is the truth. The end. Good night.”

“Or maybe,” he said, “I’ll be full of regrets. Maybe I’ll book a flight to Italy.”

“To go BARKING?” she asked.

“You mean WWOOFing?” He laughed.

“Uh-huh.” She bit back a smile. “That’s what I said.”

He turned his coaster on its side and rolled it across the table. “Seriously, though, I wish I knew what I’d end up doing.”

“That’s easy. You’ll do something you’re good at.”

“And what, exactly, do you think I’m good at?”

Her eyes went straight to his lips, which made her cheeks flame. She looked pointedly at a vintage advertisement hanging on the wall—at its depiction of green hills and daisies. “How about painting sets?” she asked.

“Preferably of cities,” he said. “And preferably only when it’s really obvious where I should paint.”

“Or political science? Or art history?”

“Interesting, I guess?”

“Okay. Hold on.” She closed her eyes and massaged her forehead. “Here’s my real prediction: In your freshman year, it’ll become clear that studying literature is perfect for you. Because you love to analyze and pick things apart and figure out what you like about them, and that’s basically what the entire major is. And the thing is, you already do that with music, but you can do it with books, too. It’s like music but minus the instruments.” She opened her eyes. “That’s what you told me a couple of months ago, right? That if you could do something that was like music but without having to play an instrument, you totally would.”

The bar was packed with people—holding full glasses over their heads, singing along with the music, talking over menus—but Gabe wasn’t looking at any of them. Only at her. He brought his mouth to her ear; his voice traveled down her neck. “Do you want to go outside?”

She pushed open the door of the bar and stepped into the cool and the quiet. The street was empty. All the streetlamps looked lonely. Aubrey stuck out her arms and spun in a circle the way she’d seen Clara do the night before.

“Having a good time?” Gabe called after her.

“The best,” she said, still spinning.

She stopped, but the world kept going—it was lights bleeding together; it was bright, intangible ropes twisting around her. “Dizzy.” She touched the top of her head. “Why would Clara do that?”

“Let’s sit down.” He led her to the wall by the bar’s door, and they slid to the ground, which was probably dirty, but Aubrey didn’t care.

“Remember our friends?” She gestured at the marionettes across the street.

“How could I forget?” Gabe lifted a hand. “How’s it going, guys? Still being disturbing as fuck, I see.”

Aubrey laughed.

“Okay. Come on,” he said. “It’s my turn.”

“For what?”

He bumped her shoulder with his. “I get to make a prediction about you.”

“Nope! You have to finish a drink first. I’ll go get us some.” She started to stand, but he touched the back of her wrist. “My prediction,” he said, “is that you are going to fit perfectly in New York.”

“Ha.”

“No, I mean it. I can see you walking down Broadway. Or going to the farmers’ market to buy apples—people in New York are big on apples; just ask my sister about that. And you can go to as many museums and concerts as you want, and afterward you’ll ride a bus home in the dark, still thinking about everything you’ve seen. You’ll probably miss your stop, but you won’t mind. I think you’ll like that feeling, actually. The letting-go feeling.”

Aubrey looked at the shape of his hands, which were now resting on his knees. She took one, sliding her fingers between his. He swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down. Memories of the rest of the day taunted Aubrey from the corners of her thoughts. They begged for her attention. But she didn’t want to give in to them. She wanted this night exactly as it was—so hot and thick she felt like she could swim in it.

Gabe let go of her hand. “Maybe we shouldn’t.”

“You’re right,” she said.

But she kissed him anyway, and he kissed her back—frenetically and passionately, his hands trailing up the back of her neck. She climbed into his lap, and the air felt even warmer, so much warmer than it had a few seconds ago.

The door to the bar opened, and Aubrey jumped up, tugging the hem of her shirt back into place, getting ready to explain herself. But the people who’d left the bar had no idea who she was. They were already walking away, footsteps snapping as they turned a corner.

“Oh no, no, no.” Everything she’d been feeling—the elation, the hope, all of it—was gone. The only thing she was left with was the memory of that afternoon.

Of Jonah.

Gabe stood, too. “Everything’s fine. You’ll stay over there, and I’ll stay here, and we’re both fine.”

“No, no, NO.” Aubrey paced the cobblestones. In the darkened window across the street, the marionettes gawked at her. “I can’t do this. I can’t be here.”

“No problem,” Gabe said. “We’ll go back to the hostel.”

She stopped pacing. “We can’t go back there together! What if Clara and Rae see us? What if they figure it out?” She stopped pacing. Her thoughts roared. Why had she just kissed him?

Why had she kissed him twice? In one day!

“We can’t go separately,” Gabe said. “It’s dangerous, Bryce.”

“I can’t do this. I need to think.” She walked to where the street narrowed into an archway and stood beneath it. Everything was changing so quickly. This day was going by so much faster than she knew how to deal with.

Gabe came to stand across from her. “We can go back now. I promise I won’t even talk to you. And Clara and Rae might not even be there yet.”

“Why did you kiss me?” she demanded.

His face blanched. “You mean tonight?”

“I mean tonight. And this afternoon. And at the beginning of the summer. Why did you kiss me when I was dating Jonah?”

“Aubrey,” he said, “I don’t know.”

“How can you not know?”

He fussed with his bracelets. “I just—don’t. It happened, but I didn’t want it to.”

“So you’re saying you didn’t want to kiss me?”

He let out a frustrated breath. “You’re not making this easy.”

“You ignored me,” she said, leaning all her weight against the archway. “For weeks you ignored me, and then yesterday you start talking to me again. You start pretending like everything is fine.”

“I wasn’t pretending. I thought we could go back to the way things were.”

“Well, clearly”—she gestured between them—“we can’t!”

Gabe kicked a stone down the street. “Look,” he said, “I ignored you because I thought you wanted some distance. I thought I was making things simple for you.”

“By treating me like crap?”

“By making it clear I wasn’t interested in you.”

It was a blow to Aubrey’s stomach.

She couldn’t even look at him.

She went back inside the bar, swerving through the crush of people, the heat of their bodies, the too-bright lights that beat down above her. She waited until she reached the bathroom to let herself sob, ducking down beneath the hand dryer, pushing both hands against her mouth. Even here, she could hear the music playing.

This wasn’t supposed to happen. She wasn’t supposed to cry over Gabe. She was supposed to cry over Jonah.

A girl came out of one of the stalls and gave Aubrey a weird look before washing her hands. The girl left, and Aubrey tried to pull herself together. She needed to do something; she needed to at least get back to the hostel. With shaking hands, she took out her phone. “Rae?” she said the second her best friend answered. “I—I’m at this—this bar. I don’t know where it is. Please. Wherever you are, please come find me.”