I don’t know how much time has passed, but we sit here on this curb in silence for so long that I start daydreaming about what life will be like when we get home. Will Cece and I be friends again? Are Ezra and I a…thing? I glance over at him and he’s already looking at me. His eyes crinkle at the corners and then I look away. That fluttery feeling in my stomach is almost too much to handle right now.

I pick up an acorn off the concrete and turn it over in my hand. I haven’t eaten in a while but that doesn’t stop the acidic taste of vomit from rising up in my throat. Whatever happens today—however disappointed Cece is when we never find that red Jeep—this will be my fault. Her pain, the experience of losing her brother again, is all my fault.

I should have been a good cousin that day. I should have barged in his room and forced him to get on the school bus in time. But it’s too late, and Cece is about to find out the truth once and for all. I can’t go back in time and make everything suddenly be okay. I’ll never be able to make this right, no matter how many crazy road trips I agree to in a futile attempt to assuage my guilt. Broken rules and lies to my parents will never make this okay.

A tear rolls down my cheek and splashes to the ground. I watch it fan out between the gritty concrete until it fades, evaporating in the summer heat. If I took therapy seriously, I might have something to talk about now. Only I’d want a private session where Cece can’t hear how badly I’ve let her down.

“Do you remember when you two had that plan to get an apartment when you graduated?” Ezra says, breaking the comfortable silence that had settled between the three of us.

Cece snorts. She’s been writing in her notebook, but she looks up now. “That was a long time ago.”

“Thomas hated it.”

“Why?” I ask.

Ezra picks up a fallen leaf and starts tearing it into little pieces. “I don’t know. I guess he was being protective of you guys. I remember he came storming into my room one day. ‘The girls think they should move out when they graduate,’ he’d said all pissed off about it. I was like, so what? But he got all mad, saying you two didn’t know how hard life is on your own.”

“That doesn’t sound like Thomas,” Cece says.

“He told us that bills were expensive but I always thought he was jealous that we had a plan to get out from my mom’s rules and he didn’t,” I say. Again, the pain of refusing to let him be our roommate burns me to the core.

“Thomas was very protective of you two,” Ezra says. “He always told me I better not hit on his sister or his cousin because they were too good for me.” He nudges me with his elbow and I can’t help but grin, even though I still feel like the worst cousin-slash-friend ever.

“You turned out okay,” Cece says.

To the right, the sound of tires on gravel makes us turn, like it has dozens of times today, but it’s just a black BMW and not the car we’re looking for.

Cece cranes her neck, looking behind us. “That office lady never came back,” she says, frowning. “I’m thinking we could leave a note for Thomas with her. Ask her to give it to the guy with the red Jeep?”

Ezra stands, shaking out his legs and stretching his arms behind his head. “She might think you’re a stalker if you do something like that.”

Cece lifts her shoulders. “I am kind of a stalker.”

“Guys.”

Ezra’s voice is deeper than usual. I crane to look up at him since I’m still sitting on the curb and he’s standing. His jaw tightens and he puts his hand up to his forehead to block the sunlight. “Is that…what I think it is?”

In the far corner of the parking lot, around where building six is, there’s something red parked between an SUV and a white box van. Cece scrambles to her feet, her backpack still on the ground beside her, and runs.

“Shit,” Ezra says, taking off after her. I drop the acorn and grab both of our backpacks and slug along behind them, my heart pounding from the heat and exhaustion and the fact that we’re all barreling toward a red Jeep Wrangler.

Cece gets there first, her finger sliding across the grill as she makes her way over to the driver’s side, the tell-tale side that will answer our biggest question.

“Well?” I say, nearly out of breath as I jog up to her, our backpacks weighing me down.

“This is it.” Cece turns around. “He must have come in the back entrance by those dumpsters.”

Ezra walks over to the driver’s side and peers in the window. “Nothing in here,” he says, moving to the rear window. “It’s clean.”

“Thank you,” Cece says. I look at her, but she’s looking at the sky. Her features are serene, and the slightest smile touches her lips. “Do you see that?” she says louder, pointing to the little blue sticker on the corner of the Jeep’s window. It’s a Piney Woods parking permit, number 601.

She turns around and peers at building six which is directly across from where the Jeep is parked. “He’s in apartment 601,” she breathes.

“Looks like it,” Ezra says. He takes Cece’s backpack from my arm and throws it over his shoulder. “Are you ready to find out who lives there?”

“No need for dramatics,” Cece says. She tosses her braid over her shoulder and walks right up to apartment 601. Her knuckles rap across the door. I hold my breath, willing my heart to stay safely behind my ribcage, no matter how badly it wants to fly out.

A woman answers. She’s young, maybe in her twenties, with light brown skin and a cropped hairstyle that’s pulled back with a pink headband. She’s pretty. She’s looking at us quizzically.

She is not Thomas.

“Hi?” she says.

Cece takes a step back. “Does Thomas Novak live here?”

The woman’s brows pull together. “No…”

“So it’s just you here?” Cece says. “Is that your Jeep?”

“Who are you?” the woman asks.

“We’re not trying to sell you anything,” Ezra says, flashing her a kind smile. “We think our friend might own that Jeep.”

“My brother,” Cece interjects. “We think that’s my brother’s Jeep. Where is he?”

The woman moves back a little, using the door to shield her from the weirdos on the other side. “I’m sorry, I think you’re mistaken. That’s my boyfriend’s car and he doesn’t have a sister.”

“But it belongs to a guy?” Cece says, undeterred by how the woman is so clearly creeped out. Instincts tell me to get the hell out of here and stop berating the poor woman, but we’ve come this far. I kind of want to know.

“What’s his name?” I ask. “Your boyfriend.”

“Blake.”

“Blake Wheatley?” Cece says.

The woman shakes her head. “Blake Ashton, and he doesn’t have a sister, I promise. Sorry I can’t help you,” she says, trying to close the door.

Cece stops it with her palm. “How old is he?”

“Twenty-three.”

“When’s his birthday?”

“Seriously?” the woman says. “Why do you care so much?”

Cece lowers her hand, her head drooping. “I’m sorry, ma’am. I am. If you could just humor me, please?”

She sighs. “His birthday is September twelfth.”

“Okay,” Cece says. “Sorry to bother you.”

When the door closes in our faces, I can hear the deadbolt twist into place. “Well, we freaked her out,” I say with a sigh.

“Thomas would only be twenty, right?” Ezra says. “And his birthday was January third.”

“Yep,” I say.

“Blake Ashton?” Cece says, screwing up her face. “That means nothing to me. That’s…nothing. September twelfth? That’s also nothing.”

Defeated, we walk back toward the front entrance. All the pep has faded from Cece’s step, and things are turning out exactly like I’ve always known they would. This massive trip was a massive disappointment.

Oddly, I’m no longer worried about Cece going crazy on me. I’d say she deserves a bit of insanity right now. I think we all do.

“I guess we should call for another Uber,” Ezra says. “And while we’re waiting for the bus to come, I want some mall food. Trashy, overpriced, super greasy food court food.” He pats his stomach and grins at me. “We could all eat our feelings right about now.”

“Whatever you want,” Cece says. “I’m not hungry.”

He throws an arm around Cece’s shoulders. “You doing okay?”

“Yeah,” she says softly. “I guess I’m fine. I mean…I just knew it was him, you know? My instincts have never let me down like this before.”

“I’m sorry, Cece. I really am.” I reach for her hand, and she lets me take it.

“Thank you,” she says, squeezing my fingers. Her green eyes have gone bloodshot. “For everything.”

As we walk toward the front office again, I feel something happen to the shredded bond between my cousin and me. It isn’t repaired, and it might never be. But for the first time in a long time, those pieces of what used to be are looking toward each other again. There’s a possibility of something. A friendship, maybe even trust.

“We’re going to be okay,” I tell her.

Heavy footsteps jog behind us. “Hey,” someone calls out. Ezra stops first, his shoulders straightening as he turns, bracing for trouble with some stranger.

The guy stops jogging. “I heard you were looking for me.”

He’s tall, and muscular in the way that means he spends hours in the gym and hundreds on supplements. His jaw is well defined, but it doesn’t hide that boyish look behind his eyes. His hair is bleached to a near white blonde. It’s long and shaggy, hanging in wet tendrils down his forehead. It almost, but not totally, covers that axe shaped birthmark on his temple. I don’t care what that woman said, this man is not twenty-three years old.

Because this man is Thomas.