Chapter 5 The Boy Who Said Don't
Declan's POV
Rochelle texts me four times before the second period ends.
I do not answer any of them. I sit in AP History and stare at the board and let my phone buzz against my leg like a heartbeat I am ignoring. Coach Merritt is talking about the Cold War and how two sides can conflict for years without ever throwing a single punch, just circling each other, waiting, and I think that is probably the most useful thing I have learned all semester.
The bell rings. I grab my bag and go.
The hallway between the second and third is always the worst one. Too many people, too narrow, everyone moving in four different directions at once. I cut through it the way I always do, straight line, no stopping, eyes forward.
That is when I see her.
Lena is about fifteen feet ahead of me in the crowd. Headphones in. Head down. Books pressed against her chest like armor. She is moving carefully, like she is trying to take up as little space as possible, as if she makes herself small enough, the hallway will just let her pass through without noticing her.
I notice her.
I do not mean to. I just do.
There is something about the way she is walking that is so deliberately invisible, it becomes the most visible thing around. Everyone else is loud and careless, and she is threading through them like a needle, precise and quiet and completely alone.
I watch her for exactly three seconds.
Then Rochelle appears at my side.
She does not come from anywhere. That is her talent. She is just suddenly there, close enough that I can smell her perfume, which she knows I used to like and now just makes me tired.
"Is that the new stepsister?" Her voice is light. Curious. The tone she uses when she already knows the answer and just wants to see what you do with the question.
Something moves in my chest. Not a feeling exactly. More like a switch.
"Don't," I say.
Rochelle raises one eyebrow. She is very good at that. One eyebrow, perfectly controlled, that says seventeen different things at once, and all of them are a challenge.
I do not explain. I look back at the hallway.
Lena turns the corner and disappears.
Rochelle watches me watch her go. I can feel it without looking. That is the thing about Rochelle, she reads people the way other people read texts, fast and looking for the thing between the lines. Six months of dating her taught me that. Six months of not dating her confirmed it.
"Interesting," she says.
"Drop it."
"I did not say anything."
"You were about to."
She smiles. It does not reach anywhere. "Text me back, Declan."
She walks away before I can answer, which is how she always ends conversations when she is winning. I stand in the emptying hallway and stare at the corner where Lena disappeared, and try to figure out why I said what I said.
I do not have an answer. I just know I meant it.
Third period. Fourth period. I go through them on autopilot. I take notes I do not need. I answer a question in Calc just to prove to myself I am paying attention, which I am not. I am thinking about Rochelle's text from last night. I found something you should see. I have been thinking about it since I read it, and I have not opened the follow-up messages because once I know what she found, I have to do something about it, and right now, I am choosing not to know.
That is not something I am proud of.
Lunch. I sit with Marcus and the rest of the guys and let the noise of the table wash over me. Marcus is telling a story about tryouts, and I laugh in the right places and eat my food, and I am doing fine. I am completely fine.
Then Marcus says, "Yo, who is the girl at table four staring this way?"
I do not look up. "Don't know."
"She is sitting with Priya Hollins. New girl, I think."
I pick up my water. "Okay."
"She keeps looking over here." Marcus grins. "You know her?"
I look up then. Not because I want to. Just because not looking is becoming its own kind of obvious.
Lena is across the cafeteria. She is not staring. She is actually looking at her food and talking to Priya. But in the half second that I look, she feels it somehow, and her eyes come up, and we lock for exactly one beat.
I look away first.
Because Rochelle is right beside me at the table, and I felt her go still the moment my eyes moved across the room, and the last thing I need is Rochelle Tate connecting dots she has already been collecting since before school started.
After lunch, I find Marcus alone by the lockers.
"What did Rochelle say to you this morning?" I ask.
Marcus does not even flinch. Which means he was expecting the question. "Nothing."
"Marcus."
He closes his locker. Looks at me sideways. "She asked me what I knew about your stepsister. I said nothing because I know nothing. She said that was going to change."
I go still.
"That is all she said?" I ask.
"That is all she said to me." He pauses. "Dec, what is going on?"
I shake my head and walk away because I do not have an answer that does not make the situation sound worse than I want it to be.
I go to the one place I think clearly. The east stairwell near the gym. It is always empty between lunch and fifth period. I sit on the top step and pull out my phone and open Rochelle's messages.
The first three are just call me. Standard.
The fourth one is a screenshot.
I look at it for a long time.
It is a social media profile. Private account, but the profile photo is visible. A man. Mid-forties. The name underneath is not Pruitt.
The name underneath is Calloway.
My blood goes cold.
I read it again. The name. The face. The account has been private and quiet for three years.
Then I open the fifth message I missed this morning. Rochelle's follow-up. Six words.
Her dad and your dad are brothers.
The stairwell is very quiet.
Lena Pruitt is not just my stepsister.
If Rochelle is right, and Rochelle is almost always right about things like this, then the man who walked out on Lena when she was a child and the man who is currently sitting in my kitchen trying to build a new family are not strangers.
They are brothers.
Which means our parents did not just happen to find each other.
And nobody told us.
