THE OXFORD DEAN beamed, cheerful and red-cheeked, as he held open the door to his study. “Miss Fuller. Thank you for sharing your thoughts regarding the Romanesque influence on twenty-second-century supertowers. I must say, this was one of the liveliest interviews I’ve had in years.”
“The pleasure was all mine, Dean Ozah,” Avery assured him. She turned outside, pulling her plaid jacket closer over her shoulders. When she saw the figure lounging past the dean’s front gate, she gave a small, private smile.
Intermittent sunlight filtered through the branches and onto Max’s face, highlighting his bold cheekbones, his prominent nose. With that floppy dark coat and windswept hair, he looked like a sentinel from some historical novel. It had been the work of a single morning, she thought wryly, for Max to revert to his disordered Oxford self.
“Avery! How did it go?” he exclaimed, hurrying forward. His eyes burned into her, as if he was trying to read the transcript of the interview on her face.
“Not to brag, but I think I crushed it.”
Max reached for Avery’s hands to twirl her in a clumsy dance move. “Of course you did!” he proclaimed, so loud that Avery had to shush him. “I knew you would!”
Avery let him lift her into the air, spinning her around so the hood of her coat fell back over her shoulders. She collapsed against his chest in laughter. Max reached out to tuck a loosened strand of hair behind her ear, making Avery feel beautiful and windblown. “I’m so proud of you,” he added and reached into the pocket of his jacket, grinning. “Good thing I brought something to celebrate with.”
He pulled out a crumpled paper bag from her favorite bakery. “Pumpkin or buttercream?”
“Buttercream,” Avery decided, reaching for the scone. Its sugar crystals glittered like diamonds in the cold afternoon light. This was so typically thoughtful of Max. “I love you,” she said quickly through a flaky mouthful of scone.
“Were you talking to me or to the buttercream?” Max teased. “You know what, actually, don’t answer that.”
As they walked back toward town, Avery told Max about the interview in more detail. She had been in her element, talkative and eager and just a teensy bit provocative; and the dean had absolutely loved it. They’d discussed everything from the future of academia to medieval illuminated manuscripts to where you could find the best lamb tandoori in Oxford. Avery felt certain that she could go to Oxford if she wanted to.
If she wanted to go? Where had that stray thought come from? Of course she wanted to go.
The setting sun bronzed the air, casting the city in a cheerful glow. Avery tried to shake her inexplicable sense of unease. The interview was finally over and she was here with Max, eating scones, in a city that she loved. Best of all, she was out of New York, away from the inauguration plans, the prospect of constantly seeing Atlas. There were no zettas buzzing around her face, no one stopping her on the street to ask for an interview. So why did she still feel on edge?
“Where should we go?” she asked. Maybe if she kept moving, she would shake off this strange restlessness. “Want to meet up with Luke and Tiana?”
“We can,” Max said nonchalantly. “But there’s somewhere I want to take you first.”
He led her along the bustle of Main Street, down a quieter avenue that Avery had never noticed before. A magical hush seemed to fall over them. The street was lined with an array of small buildings in charming colors. The cobblestones were so bright they seemed to sing beneath her feet.
Max led her up a single flight of stairs to a heavy, carved door that was flanked by a pair of brassy light fixtures. “After you,” he said.
Avery tried not to look too knowing as she started up the steps. One of their friends must have moved here, and Max had asked them to help organize a surprise party for her. A little presumptuous, given that she wasn’t technically admitted to Oxford, but Max was always ready to celebrate things that hadn’t happened yet.
She paused to arrange her features into a suitably surprised face, and pushed at the front door. It swung open easily at her touch.
The Surprise! she expected didn’t come. Avery blinked, puzzled, and stepped into the entryway.
It was a charmingly old ramshackle apartment, with scuffed wooden floors and faded yellow walls. There were a few stray pieces of furniture, a heavy rug and a bookcase covered in a fine film of dust. She walked past the narrow kitchen to a small patio out back, where a single folding table and matching chairs had been arranged.
“What do you think?” Max followed her outside.
Avery turned around slowly, taking it all in. “Who lives here?”
“We do. I mean, if you want to,” Max amended hastily. “I put in an offer this morning.”
Avery felt suddenly light-headed. She sank into one of the metal folding chairs.
“Max,” she said helplessly, “we don’t even know if I’ll get in. . . .”
“Didn’t you just say that you crushed the interview? You’ll get in,” he declared. “I figured it makes sense for us to buy a place instead of paying rent; we’ll be in Oxford for the next four years at least, while you’re at university. Maybe longer, if I get into the PhD program, or if you decide to go to grad school.”
“I’m not sure I want to get a PhD,” Avery protested.
“Why not? You’re smart enough to,” Max declared. “This is a great place for us, Avery.”
“It is,” she said softly, glancing around. This apartment seemed so . . . Max. But she wasn’t sure it felt like her.
“I know it’s a little unfinished. It needs some rugs and art. Which is where you come in,” Max said and smiled. “But can’t you picture us here, curling up in the living room to grade papers? Having friends over for dinner? Standing out here on a warm summer night to watch the fireflies? You can almost see part of the river, if you look that way,” he added, pointing eagerly.
Avery felt as if the air in her lungs was trapped. Max was only two years older than her, yet he was so much surer of himself. He had his whole life—or rather, both their lives—completely planned out.
Max seemed unnerved by her silence. “Unless you don’t want to live here. I mean, if you aren’t ready yet. . . .”
Even though she felt frozen by an inexplicable sense of panic, Avery recoiled from the prospect of hurting Max. Her face unfolded into a smile. “Of course I want to live here,” she assured him, and paused as another idea occurred to her. “Did you say that you bought this place? Max, please at least let me pay for half of it.”
“It’s okay. I have some money saved. I wanted to do this, for you. For us.” Max leaned forward with a quiet intensity. “I love you, Avery Fuller,” he began, and even though they were both sitting—even though he wasn’t on one knee—Avery had the sensation that what he was about to say was something akin to a proposal.
“The last year with you has been so perfect. You are perfect. You’re like a dream that I’ve been longing for my whole life and never thought I would find. And now that I’ve found you, all I can think about is how much I want to be with you always.”
Avery felt that flutter of panic again. “I’m not perfect, Max.” It wasn’t fair of him to ask that of her, to build her into some untenable ideal in his mind and then inevitably be disappointed when she failed to live up to it. No relationship could withstand that sort of pressure.
Atlas had always known better than to use the word perfect with her.
“Right, no one is perfect. You’re just as close as it is humanly possible to be,” Max replied, not understanding her meaning; and for some perverse reason Avery needed him to understand. The way Atlas always had.
She also knew that she shouldn’t be thinking of Atlas right now.
“I’m not perfect,” she repeated. Something in Max’s eyes frightened her, though she wasn’t sure why. “I’m impatient and defensive and petty, and I’m not worth that kind of blind devotion. No one is.”
His face had gone pale. “What are you saying? Are you telling me not to love you?”
“No, I just . . .” She let her head fall forward into her hands, fighting off a nameless sense of dread. “I don’t want to disappoint you.”
“And I don’t want to disappoint you, Avery. But I’m sure I will, a thousand times, and I’m sure you’ll disappoint me too. As long as we’re honest with each other, we can get through anything.”
As long as we’re honest with each other. Avery pushed aside the tiny voice that was reminding her of all the things she hadn’t told Max: The truth about Eris’s death. The investigation about Mariel. Her relationship with Atlas.
But none of that mattered anymore, she reminded herself. Those secrets all belonged to the old Avery, and she had left the old Avery behind in New York. She was starting over.
Max reached into his pocket.
For a single, paralyzing moment Avery thought he was pulling out a ring, and her heart skipped and skidded wildly in her chest because she had no idea what she would do if he did.
Then her breath let out, because it was only a set of old-fashioned brass key-chips, for automatic entry into the house. Max looked up and met her eyes. She wondered if he’d heard the relief in that sigh.
“I love you,” he said simply. “All I want is to make you as happy as you make me. I want to see your first smile of the day when you wake up, and the last one before you go to sleep. I want to share my fears and my hopes and dreams with you. I want to build a life with you.” He slid one of the pair of key-chips toward her across the wrought-iron table.
“I love you too,” Avery whispered, because she did.
“Are you crying?” Max lifted a hand to her face, capturing the single tear that had escaped to run down her cheek. “I’m sorry, I know the apartment is kind of a fixer-upper. If you hate it, we can pick another one,” he hastened to add, and Avery shook her head.
She wasn’t sure why she was crying. She loved Max. They fit together so easily, without conflict or friction or obstacles. He made Avery the best version of herself. So why wasn’t her love for him as free and unencumbered as his was for her?
Why wasn’t she as blazingly certain of what she wanted as he seemed to be?
“I’m crying because I’m so happy,” she said and leaned over to kiss him, wishing it were that simple.