“So which house is this?” I asked, trying to keep my voice light and pleasantly curious. I knew she had four deliveries to make this round, but I had no idea where Jamie Roarke fell in that order.

Dawn picked up the ticket on top of the carrier and peered down at it. “Greg Milton,” she read, then groaned. “He always orders like four kinds of meat toppings. I can barely lift his pizzas, they’re so heavy. Did you want to come to the door?”

“No, that’s okay,” I said. I knew I was going to have to psych myself up to hug Jamie Roarke, whoever that was, and could use a moment of quiet. “I’ll just wait here.”

“Cool,” Dawn said, heading toward the house. “Be right back.”

As I watched Dawn walk up to the front door and ring the bell, I leaned back against her car, a green Volkswagen convertible with a triangular Captain Pizza car topper. But rather than being on the roof, where I’d always seen them on pizza delivery cars, this was on the trunk of the car, like a shark fin.

She was walking back toward the car only a few moments later, tucking some cash into the front pocket of her shorts, and I let out a breath as I pulled the passenger-side door open and got in the car. I told myself that it didn’t matter if Dawn thought I was weird, or if I scared this Jamie person, or if I would feel like I couldn’t go back to Captain Pizza for the rest of the summer. I had to do this.

“So is this the last delivery?” I asked, twenty minutes and two other Jamie-free deliveries later, hoping I didn’t sound as nervous as I felt as Dawn pulled down the driveway of a small, light-blue house.

“Yeah,” Dawn said, shooting me a sympathetic look. “Has this just been so boring for you? It’s for Jamie Roarke. She’s the nicest, and she has the cutest puggle . . .”

Dawn got out of the car, and, hoping it sounded somewhat natural and spontaneous, I unbuckled my seat belt and said, “I think I’ll come with you this time, if that’s okay.”

“Sure,” Dawn said as she reached into the back and grabbed the carrier. “Come on.”

I got out of the car, feeling my heart beating hard. I was grateful that this Jamie was a woman—it just seemed like it would make things easier. I followed behind Dawn, noticing for the first time that there was writing on the back of her shirt as well. Captain Pizza—We’re a MAJOR deal! was emblazoned across her shoulder blades. I stood next to Dawn on the mat as she rang the bell, which chimed Pachelbel’s canon. The door opened, and a woman who looked to be in her forties stood behind it, a dog peeking out from around her ankles.

“Hi,” she said, fumbling in her wallet for some bills. “Sorry—you always get here so fast, I’m never quite sorted.”

“No worries,” Dawn said as she slid the pizza out of the carrier and dropped the now-empty bag at her feet.

I just stared at Jamie Roarke, my pulse pounding, willing her to come out from behind the door. She was still half hidden behind it. What was I supposed to do, pull the door open and hug her? What if she thought I was attacking her or something?

“I could have sworn I picked up some ones yesterday,” she murmured as I swallowed hard and tried to get my courage up. I could do this. I could hug a total stranger. As though somehow sensing the direction my thoughts were going, the puggle at Jamie Roarke’s feet started growling. “Quiet,” she said as the dog bared his teeth—I was pretty sure—right at me. “Okay, got it,” she said, looking up at Dawn and smiling as she handed over some bills. Her eyes landed on me, standing there in what was clearly not a Captain Pizza uniform, and her smile faded.

“That’s Emily,” Dawn said as she pocketed the bills and handed Jamie Roarke her pie. “She’s just . . . observing.”

Jamie Roarke gave me a nod, and I knew it was my moment. I just had to do this. Who cared what this woman or Dawn thought? I just had to reach out and hug her. My opportunity was right in front of me. I tried to make myself do it, just take a step forward and give her a hug. But I couldn’t seem to move. I just stood there, frozen, my heart slamming against my chest while I watched my opportunity slip away as Jamie Roarke thanked Dawn and then closed the door.

“So that’s how it works,” Dawn said as she picked up the empty carrier. She looked over at me in Jamie Roarke’s porch light, where the moths were beginning to circle, drawn toward the brightness. “You okay?”

I nodded, and walked to Dawn’s car without speaking, furious with myself. Who knew why Sloane had put this on the list, but she had—and it was one of the easier ones. And I couldn’t even do it. The second things got hard, or I couldn’t hide in the woods, I just gave up. I got into the passenger seat, slamming the door harder than I needed to, staring out the window, hating myself.

“Um,” Dawn said as she started the car, glancing over at me. “You sure you’re all right?”

“Fine,” I said, hoping I didn’t sound as upset as I currently felt. “I’m just . . . really tired.”

“Oh my god, me too,” Dawn said with a sigh. “I just feel like this has been the longest day ever. Do you ever feel that way? Like some days take five years, and others are over in like a minute?” Dawn talked on as we drove back, and didn’t seem to notice that I wasn’t saying much. I was happy to have her fill up the car with conversation, helping distract me from the truth of how I’d so decisively failed.

She parked crookedly in what I wasn’t exactly sure was a spot, and as we both got out of the car, I saw Dawn bite her lip as she looked toward Captain Pizza. “It’ll be okay,” I said, without even thinking about it first. I wasn’t sure I should have said it, since I had no way of knowing if it would be true. But Dawn shot me a smile that was much less trembly than the one she’d given me when she’d first shown up at Paradise that afternoon.

“I hope so,” she said. “And thanks for coming with me tonight. The company really helped.”

“Oh,” I said. I felt myself smile at her, and I knew now wasn’t the moment to tell her the real reason I’d wanted to come along. “I’m glad,” I said truthfully. Dawn lifted her hand in a wave, then headed back up to the pizzeria, and I crossed the parking lot toward my car. I started to head home—after all, I didn’t have anywhere else to go. But as I got closer, the thought of going back—to my quiet house and the hot, empty stillness of my room—started to make me feel claustrophobic. I turned off the road that would take me there and steered my car toward Stanwich’s main downtown. There didn’t seem to be a lot of activity going on—it was getting late, and this was, especially during the week, an early-to-bed town. The lights were still on in the diner, and I could see some booths that faced the windows were filled—the diner was pretty much the only place to eat after ten during the week. Most of the businesses downtown were closed, their lights off, and I could see, through the glass doors of the movie theater, a yawning employee cleaning the popcorn machine.