Page 54 of The Wreckage of Us

“I love the new songs. They are perfect.”

“It’s all because of you. Those songs only existed because of you.” He gave me a sleepy smile, picked up his phone, and began typing.

Ian:Good night, Haze.

Hazel:Good night.

He fell asleep before I did that night, because for the first time in ages, being awake didn’t feel like a nightmare. I stayed frozen in place as his body warmed mine, and I tried to collect all the information of what had gone down over the past week.

Number one: Ian had slept beside me to help keep my demons at bay.

Number two: he’d built me a freaking she-shed so I could look up at the stars.

Three, four, and five: he’d watched over me, he’d shared his secret confessions, and he’d listened to mine.

Lastly, there was number six: the butterflies he left floating in my gut.

Oh yes.

We couldn’t forget about the butterflies.

16

HAZEL

“Two words for you:Bon. Fire,” Leah gleefully expressed, waving her hands in the air with excitement. She’d been stopping by the ranch to visit me—and the horses—almost every day since she’d picked me up on the side of the road. I would’ve tried to push her away, because I had a fear of letting people get close to me, but Leah was like a burst of sunshine on the cloudiest day. I couldn’t keep her away if I wanted to.

“I thinkbonfireis one word,” I joked, feeding Dottie an apple.

Leah rolled her eyes. “Don’t be a smart-ass, Hazel. Two words, one word—it doesn’t matter. There’s the annual bonfire happening this weekend at the lakefront, and you need to be there with me.”

“Are there going to be a lot of people?”

“Tons of people!”

“Partying and dancing?”

“So much partying and dancing!”

“And you said a ton of people, right?”

She grinned wider, as if she were going to explode from the excitement of it all. “Yes, yes! Pretty much everyone in town goes to the summer bonfire—one word, not two.”

I laughed and shook my head back and forth. “Then go ahead and count me out.”

Her mouth dropped open. “What? No way. You have to come, Hazel. It will be so much fun.”

“I’m not really a big people person, so being around all those people seems somewhat like a nightmare to me. The only kind of people I really like hanging out with are fictional and live within the pages of a book.”

Leah rolled her eyes and began brushing Dottie. “You’re being crazy. There will be boys there. Hot, hot boys who are tan and buff and delicious. Oh, Haze, you have to come! You just have to do it. Think about it—bathing suits, drinks, and great music all night.”

I knew Leah was new to what it meant to be my friend, so I’d give her the benefit of the doubt for misunderstanding everything about me, but the last thing I wanted to do was hang out with strangers in bathing suits.

Leah must’ve seen the resistance in my stare. “Come on, Hazel. You work so hard at the ranch, and you never really give yourself any days off. You think I don’t see you working on your days off? You’re a youthful workaholic, which is an oxymoron if I ever did hear one. So let your hair down and come to the bonfire with me.”

“I don’t know, Leah ...”

She sighed and tossed her hands up in defeat. “Fine, fine. It’s just too bad. The Wreckage is performing, and I figured you’d like to see them.”