"Thanks for taking care of these for me." Lily hugged me, then shoved pink homecoming fliers into my hands before sprinting off.
She was volunteering at the State Academy for Young Ladies again, which—despite its formal name—was a correctional institute designed to institutionalize girls who'd been lost in the cracks of society. At least, according to my father. According to rumor, the place was a shithole. But, hey, it looked great on college applications, hence Lily's gold-plated heart. Meanwhile, I had the responsibility of taping the posters around campus.
"Just to remind everyone of this Friday,"Lily had explained—as if anyone could forget. Our school revolved around the homecoming dance. It was one of the only days a year boys and girls could intermingle without teachers finding excuses to push them apart. And yet, Lily somehow managed to convince herself that students would forget. I would never understand her intensity.
I held the last flyer between my lips as I tied my long brown hair into a ponytail. It was hot. Too hot. But nothing unusual for August in the State. All we had this time of the year was stifling, summer heat. My only concern was the forest; it could get dry enough to cause a fire. By this time, I should've already been home, checking the acres for risk spots, but my dad was home for once. He would take over the task, and Argos would accept him as a temporary fill-in while I was absent.
I let my ponytail fall against my neck, and I breathed as a rare gust of wind blew by, cooling my heated skin. It had been a long day, and I had a feeling it was about to get much longer.
Closing my eyes, I listened to the familiar sounds of the town, hoping to feel a sense of normalcy, but I couldn't forget the night before. Broden was involved with tomo. On top of that, Miles was somehow involved, and I wondered if Lily was too—if everyone in my life was. The question made me nauseous.
I shook my head, desperately trying to dislodge my memories, and then lifted my hands to grab the last flyer. As soon as my fingertips brushed it, the wind pulled the paper out of my grasp. It flipped through the air, twirling and spiraling, the glossy color glowing like pink fire. When it swooped to the ground, it smacked into the leg of a tall man dressed in a sage uniform. A soldier. Suddenly terrified, I rushed after it, apologizing profusely as the soldier leaned down to grab it from the ground, his fingers uncovered by shooting gloves. A military student, then.
"Do you need this?" he asked as he straightened up. His voice was as deep and calm as his eyes. But every alarm in my body went off.
At first glance, he appeared normal—a standard military student about my age—but up close, details changed. One moment, his eyes looked to be a deep brown, the next the sage color of his uniform brought out the green hiding behind colored contacts. And his dark hair matched the color of his eyes too perfectly. Hair dye.
I studied his familiar features. This guy had brown hair, brown eyes, and a sage uniform. Not blond hair, green eyes, or a black T-shirt. But I was positive. Absolutely positive.
"Noah?"
He squinted, irritated. "Nate," he corrected, then glanced down at the pink flyer. "Nate Harper."
I was right. It was him.
"Right. Nate." I curled my hands into fists, trying to control my nerves. "Where'd you get the uniform?"
"Stole it from the lumberyard," he answered nonchalantly, too focused on the flyer to care about the people walking around us. He was probably memorizing it.
Nauseated, I realized our situation had completely flipped.
In the forest, I had stolen his information. Now he had mine, and I wanted to attack him just as much as he probably wanted to hurt me back in the woods. Still, I remained calm. I couldn't do anything dramatic with everyone watching, not when Broden was involved, but not everything called for dramatics.
Focusing on his lack of attention, I sprung forward, snatching the flyer from his hands. He didn't even budge when I moved back.
"What do you want?" I asked, crumpling the paper in my hands. Maybe he wouldn't notice how I shook then.
He stared at my hands, his fingers still spread out like he held the paper, and then he sighed and dropped his hand to the front of his sage jacket. "I'm looking for Broden."
"Why?"
Noah lowered his eyes to meet mine. "Because I am."
"I would think he'd be in military school," I answered, knowing he had obviously been there already. I didn't know who gave Noah the State-issued uniform, but I knew it was authentic. No one could fake those sideways stitches and get ahold of gold buttons.
Noah shifted, as if he sensed how I studied his clothes. "He wasn't there."
"Oh, and he didn't tell you where he'd be? That's weird," I mocked. "Really, I would've thought he would be waiting for you."
"I hope you're not testing me," Noah's voice danced on the edge of intensity, "because I wouldn't appreciate that, Ms. Gray."
My grip on the paper tightened at the sound of my last name. I had never told him my name, first or last, yet he knew both, and he knew where I went to school. Whether I liked it or not, he knew more about me than I knew about him.
"I don't have to help you," I said.
"And I don't need your help."
"And I don't need your trouble."
"Trouble," Noah repeated. "You think that I"—he pointed to his chest—"am trouble?"
"I know you're trouble." I corrected, turning on my heel. If he wouldn't leave, then I would, and he wouldn't stop me. His fake identity was all he had, and one shout could ruin that.
Indignant, I grabbed my backpack, so I could head home. Thinking he would at least have the decency to allow me to walk away was my first mistake. He took one stride and stood right next to me. When I started walking, he walked with me.
"What makes you think that?" he asked, acting as if following a stranger wasn't taboo in the slightest.
My anger turned to annoyance. "Well, aside from two nights ago," I spoke as I contemplated the best way to retrieve my knife from my backpack, "how about you explain why Broden got beat up?"
Noah's demeanor fell before he switched to his default emotion—stern and indecipherable. "You think that was me?"
"No," I admitted, before I realized I felt that way all along, "but I bet it had to do with you."
His fingers tapped against his black watch. "How long have you known Broden, anyway? I've never heard of you."
I glared at him. "For your information, I haven't heard of you either."
His eyebrows shot up. For the first time since I met him, he was thrown off guard. "So, when exactly did Broden and you become such good friends?"
"When did Broden and you not?"
He stopped walking with me, and I didn't wait for him to catch up. I didn't dare look back. I didn't dare head in the direction of my house either. Noah knew where I lived, and the last thing I wanted was for him to meet me there. I would go to the hospital and watch Falo while Lyn worked.
To stay calm, I concentrated on the sounds of my heels as they tapped across the ground, and shifted my backpack to my other shoulder. At least, I had the comfort of my knife. It was my best friend this time of the day, when the roads began to quiet, and the shops started to empty for the evening. For a few minutes, I was convinced that our encounter was over, and then I heard his boots as he ran up behind me. I almost reached for my blade, but by the time I made the decision to go for it, he strode up next to me, perfectly calm. He offered a boyish smile.
I rolled my eyes. Unbelievable.
"You have no conscience, do you?" I asked.
"You have no filter, do you?"
"I have no fear," I corrected, hearing the arrogance in my voice. Who was I kidding? In many ways, I feared the stranger walking beside me. "I think there's a difference."
"No fear." Noah's words danced with amusement, as if to laugh at my lies, but I nodded, and he shrugged it off. "Must be easy when you're never faced with something you're afraid of."
"I've had to face things," I snapped.
"I'm sure you have," he chuckled.
I glanced over. He was walking with his arms propped behind his head, relaxing in the summer sun. The only times I had seen him he had been serious, yet he now laughed like an everyday teenager. Even the dark shadows beneath his eyes had disappeared. Maybe he'd finally rested. But I couldn't believe I was staring at the same person from the night before. It was as if Nate Harper had literally taken Noah's place. I had to consciously remind myself that I wasn't walking with a carefree friend.
The buildings spaced out, the road stretched on, and sunlight burned against our skin as it closed in on evening. We were silent for a while, and I wondered how he was walking around so freely without question like Broden had yesterday. Clearly, the two understood the system well enough to escape military school, and Noah obviously understood Border Patrol enough to sneak by. I hated to guess what else he understood. He, at least, knew we weren't heading to my house. By the way his eyes darted about the road, I assumed he was putting the pieces together. Not much had changed in the Topeka Region, after all. Not in our lifetime anyway.
The main square always consisted of a pharmacy, barber, and food market. Beyond that, education row sat, a collection of schools separated by fences and neighborhoods, which housed teachers and their families, all organized by income, often designated by their spouse's income rather than their own. The highest earners, of course, worked in one of the many government buildings caging the city in.
Just beyond the horizon, enormous gray buildings sat. Only a few had windows, which caused the largest building with glass to shine from sunlight reflections.
"The hospital," Noah blurted, then stopped. This time, I froze with him, struck by his tone and the way he watched me. I felt exposed. "You were with Broden at the hospital."
Memories from Broden's recent injuries flashed through my mind, and I nodded.
Noah's expression softened. "I should have recognized that hair."
Heat rose to my cheeks. "You weren't there."
He couldn't have been. He was in the forest when I heard the news, and Lyn had to drive me. It would've been impossible for Noah to follow on foot or car. The cop would've stopped him just as he stopped us, but he wouldn't have let Noah go. We would've seen him.
As my mind raced, Noah offered his hand the way he had to Broden last night—for another handshake. "I think we got off on the wrong foot, Sophie," he said, continuing to use my nickname he enjoyed. My heart pounded again, but this time it wasn't out of fear. "I want to start over."
Under the sunlight, Noah's brown hair darkened, but my memory would not forget how his blond hair had glistened. Even as the sky blackened and his brown eyes deepened, his green eyes were impossible to neglect. He morphed into Nate Harper, but he was still Noah, and Broden's warning echoed in my ears.
Stay away from him—and me.
I knew I couldn't keep my promise, but I hadn't realized how quickly I would have to break it. If I could help Broden get out of trouble by helping Noah, I would, but Broden wouldn't see it that way. He would never see it that way.
Noah flickered his hand; the face of his watch flashed. "What do you have to lose?"
Everything. I had everything to lose. My reputation. My record. My friendship. My family. Probably parts of my life I hadn't considered yet. But my gut instinct told me I could also save everything by shaking his hand. Even though I wanted to scream, smack his hand away, and pretend he never existed, I didn't.
I forced a smile, reached out, and took his hand. His skin was warm and consoling, not cold and ruthless like I had expected it would be.
"Nice to meet you, then," I said.
"Nice to meet you, too," Noah responded.
I dropped my hand, only realizing then that we never actually shook hands. We simply held them. At the thought, my palm tingled, and I stared at his hand, still raised where we touched, his palm exposed.
When I was a child in Albany, a fortuneteller pondered every line on my palm. Your future isn't set, she had said. Yours is the only one. The reading was only a game then, but only now did the memory come back. I wondered why she said what she did to me, wondered what she would've said to him if they'd met. Staring at the tiny lines his skin formed, I felt as if I were staring at the future face-to-face, as if I had taken tomo and completely lost my mind, and then I forced myself to look away, so I could say what I needed to.
"I know where Broden is."