Free That Night by Chevy Stevens

hey-we’re-cool gesture. But it didn’t matter what Ryan said or who he threatened, it was already all over school—kids whispered and giggled when I walked down the hallway to my afternoon class. I tried to look like I didn’t care, but my cheeks were hot and I felt close to tears.
    After school, Ryan and I got coffee at Tim Hortons and drove around on some back roads. We’d been silent for a while, just listening to the music, smoking cigarettes, both of us thinking, when he finally said, “Was it true?”
    “Is what true?”
    “About Jason. Did you, you know…”
    My face burned. I’d hoped he wasn’t going to ask. “He was different back then. And Shauna…” I told him the whole story, how she’d set me up, how Jason had pressured me. At the end, I said, “Are you pissed?”
    “At you? Nah. It was a long time ago.”
    But his voice sounded kind of distant, and when I reached for his hand he didn’t hold it as tight, and he didn’t look over and smile like always. I stared out the window, blinked back tears. I couldn’t wait to graduate, to leave this stupid school and Shauna far behind.
    *   *   *
    Ryan dropped me off. We kissed and he said, “I’ll see you at school tomorrow,” but I watched him driving off, feeling anxious when he burned rubber at the end of the road. I knew it was crazy, but I couldn’t help worrying, for the first time ever, that he might break up with me, that this had changed things between us. My mom was serving dinner, but I said I wasn’t feeling well, ignored her curious look, and went straight to my room. She’d be the last person I’d confide in about a problem with Ryan—hell, she’d probably throw a party and celebrate. Safe in my room, I put on some music and lay on my bed, my hand on my stomach, trying to hold in the sick feeling. I told myself it would be fine, Ryan would get over it. Then I got mad. If Ryan wanted to dump me over something I did three years ago, he was a jerk. It’s not like he’d been a total saint before we met. Still … my gaze drifted over to my photo of us.
    I couldn’t imagine my life without him, couldn’t imagine facing school or even walking down the hall if I didn’t have Ryan. The thought was so awful, the pressure in my chest enormous. I went into the bathroom and turned on the shower, then stayed under the hot spray until I felt a little better, the terrifying emotions flowing out of me. It was going to be okay. It had to be okay.
    An hour later I was on my bed writing Ryan a letter when I heard a soft knock at my window. It was Ryan. He was wearing a brown knit hat pulled low, almost to his eyes, and an older leather jacket, open over a gray sweater. His cheeks were ruddy from the cold. I motioned for him to stay there and checked that my door was locked. I could hear my parents talking downstairs and dishes clanging in the kitchen. I was pretty sure they wouldn’t be able to hear anything, but my window could be loud, the wood tight so that it always squeaked when I slid it open. I turned up my music, then opened the window fast.
    “What are you doing here? My parents are downstairs.”
    He must have climbed up to the roof from the tree behind my house. The tree Nicole and I had climbed down last summer, sneaking to the beach for a late-night swim, coming home cold and shivering but exhilarated by our bravery.
    “I missed you.” He smiled.
    I didn’t smile back, still upset about earlier. “You could’ve called.”
    His smiled dropped. “I had to see you. I’m sorry, baby. For how I was being after school. I don’t like thinking about you with anyone else, and sometimes I forget it hasn’t always just been you and me, you know?”
    “It’s the same for me when I see your ex.”
    He leaned into the window, grabbed some of my hair, and pulled me closer until we were eye to eye. “I never felt anything for her like I do for you. She was nothing. What we have is real and forever, okay?”
    “Okay.”
    We