Riley watched me from the other side of the bed with his hair still a disaster and his face still creased from sleep, looking far too pleased with himself for someone who had apparently accused me of fry theft before he was even fully conscious.

I sat against his headboard with the journal pressed to my chest and the pillow I had thrown at him lying between us like evidence of my perfectly justified violence.

He glanced at the journal. "Did you finish it?"

I looked down at the cover beneath my hands. "No."

"Why not?"

"Because you woke up and started being annoying."

"That does sound like me." He shifted onto his side, propping his head up on one hand as he looked at me. "You should finish it."

I blinked. "Right now?"

"Yeah. It's quiet. Everyone downstairs is either asleep or pretending they're not about to turn Halloween into a military operation. This is probably the only time you'll have before both families start getting crazy."

I looked toward the closed bedroom door. He was right. The house was still calm, but it wouldn't last. Eventually, Milo and Hudson would wake up and remember they were children with costumes to discuss. Lydia and Brooklyn would start fighting over bathroom time. Willow and my mom would begin organizing breakfast, costumes, candy bags, and whatever else mothers organized when the rest of us were barely alive. Halloween chaos was waiting downstairs like a storm holding its breath.

I looked back at Riley. "You really don't mind?"

He shook his head. "I gave it to you."

"I know, but it's still weird."

"Everything is weird."

That made me pause.

Then I smiled sadly. "Fair."

Riley settled back against his pillow, but his eyes stayed on me. "Read it. I'll be quiet."

I stared at him. He stared back.

I raised an eyebrow. "You? Quiet?"

"I can be quiet."

"You once lost a silent game to Milo when he was three."

"I don't remember that, so it doesn't count."

"It absolutely counts."

"Read the journal, Autumn."

I rolled my eyes, but I opened it anyway. The next page started with a sentence that made me immediately regret everything.

Autumn says she is a morning person. This is one of her most dangerous lies.

I looked over at Riley.

He looked innocent.

I continued.

She likes the idea of morning. She likes sunlight and birds and coffee and pretending she is the kind of person who wakes up peacefully. In reality, Autumn wakes up like a haunted doll that has been disturbed from a curse. She does not speak for at least twenty minutes unless spoken to first, and even then, the reply is usually a glare or a sound that cannot legally be considered language.

I pressed my lips together.

Riley noticed. "Bad?"

"Horrible."

"Good."

I read on.

Today she came downstairs wearing two different socks, one inside out, and then got offended when I pointed it out. She said, "Maybe I'm starting a trend." No, Juliet. You are losing a battle against laundry.

I laughed despite myself, the sound soft in the quiet room. "I hate him."

Riley's mouth curved. "Old me?"

"Yes."

"Understandable."

The entry continued, and beneath it was a tiny sketch of me holding a mug with both hands, my hair a mess, eyes narrowed over the rim like I was threatening someone with silence. Under the drawing, Riley had written:

Do not approach before coffee. She bites.

I shook my head, smiling. "You were so mean."

Riley leaned slightly closer. "Was I wrong?"

I looked at him over the top of the journal.

He lifted both hands. "Don't answer. Your face answered."

I turned the page before I could throw another pillow at him.

Autumn has declared she is going to become mysterious.

I froze, then immediately groaned. "Oh no."

Riley's eyebrows rose. "That sounds promising."

"No, it's humiliating."

His smile grew.

I kept reading anyway.

She said this while wearing fuzzy socks with pumpkins on them and eating cereal out of a mixing bowl because all the normal bowls were dirty. I told her mysterious people probably wash dishes. She told me that was exactly what society expected me to think.

I covered my face with one hand.

Riley started laughing quietly. "I don't even remember this, but I'm proud of myself."

"You shouldn't be."

"I really am."

I dropped my hand and continued.

She lasted forty-two minutes. Then she sent me a picture of a cloud shaped like a rabbit and asked if I thought it was a sign from the universe. Mystery era over.

I remembered that day so clearly I could almost feel the spoon in my hand and the soft embarrassment of Riley laughing at me through text. It should have been nothing. A stupid little moment. Something too small to matter. But seeing it written down in his handwriting made my chest ache because Riley had kept it. He had thought it was worth remembering.

The next pages were full of things like that.

Little things. Stupid things.

Me leaving my water bottle in his car three times in one week.

Me insisting I did not snore and Riley writing in capital letters that I absolutely did, but only when I was "sleeping like I had been personally defeated by the day."

Me getting emotionally attached to a mug at a thrift store and making him drive back because I decided it "looked lonely."

Me once texting him, Do you think worms feel proud after it rains? and Riley writing beneath it:

I don't know how to respond to this, but I know better than to ignore it.

I laughed so quietly my shoulders shook.

Riley watched me with this look I didn't know how to name. Not memory. Not exactly. More like curiosity softened by something else. Like he was watching me read about a friendship he didn't remember and trying to learn the shape of it from my reactions.

I turned another page.

Autumn cannot lie to save her life. She thinks she can, which is somehow worse. Her left eyebrow twitches when she's hiding something. She also avoids eye contact and suddenly becomes very interested in random objects. Today she told me she definitely did not eat the last brownie while staring directly at a lamp.

I narrowed my eyes. "That brownie was mine."

Riley tilted his head. "Was it?"

"It should have been."

"That sounds like theft again."

I ignored him and kept reading.

She did eat it. There was chocolate on her sleeve.

I looked down at my current sleeve like I had been personally attacked by the past.

I let her think she got away with it because she looked too proud of herself. Sometimes you have to let small animals believe they are predators.

I gasped. "Small animals?"

Riley laughed into his pillow.

I pointed at him with the journal. "You are lucky you don't remember writing this."

"I feel lucky."

"You should feel afraid."

"I do, actually."

"Good."

I turned the page.

There were sweet things too, but never in a way that made my heart foolish. Never in a way that could be mistaken for romance if I was honest with myself. Riley's words were warm, teasing, familiar. They were the words of someone who loved me deeply but had never once thought to place that love in the same category where I had placed mine.

Autumn stayed with Lydia today after Lydia pretended she didn't care about something she absolutely cared about. Autumn didn't make a big deal out of it. She just sat on Lydia's floor and painted her nails badly while they talked about nothing. Lydia acted annoyed. She wasn't.

I swallowed.

Autumn is good at staying without making people admit they need her to stay.

My eyes burned.

Riley was quiet.

I read the next entry.

She helped Milo tie his shoes even though he untied them three seconds later because he wanted to do it himself. She didn't get mad. I would have gotten mad. Autumn just said, "Okay, then show me," and sat on the floor until he figured it out.

A tear slipped down my cheek before I could stop it.

She has more patience with children than she does with me, which is offensive but probably fair.

I laughed through the tear.

Riley's voice was soft. "Nice one?"

I nodded. "Mostly."

"Mostly?"

"You insulted yourself at the end."

"That also sounds like me."

"It does."

I wiped my cheek and continued reading.

Autumn gets scared that she is too much.

My breath caught.

The room seemed to quiet around me.

Riley stopped smiling.

I stared at the sentence for a long moment before forcing myself to keep going.

She has never said it exactly like that, but I know. She apologizes when she cries. She apologizes when she panics. She apologizes when she talks too long about something she loves. She apologizes when she needs someone. It makes me want to shake her, but she'd probably cry, and then she'd apologize again.

A small, broken laugh escaped me.

She is not too much. She is a lot, but "a lot" is not the same thing as "too much." A forest is a lot. The ocean is a lot. The sky is a lot. Nobody looks at the sky and says it should be smaller.

My vision blurred.

There it was. Something so sweet it hurt.

Not romantic. Not a love confession.

But love anyway.

Huge love. Best friend love.

Riley love.

I pressed my fingers to my mouth and tried to breathe around it.

Riley sat up a little. "Autumn?"

I shook my head quickly. "I'm okay."

"You're crying."

"I know."

"Did I say something bad?"

"No." My voice trembled. "You said something really nice, which is worse."

His expression softened.

I looked back at the page.

If she ever reads this, which she won't because I'm not stupid, she'll probably say that was poetic and then ruin it by making fun of me for having feelings.

I laughed. "There you are."

Riley smiled faintly. "Balanced it out?"

"Unfortunately."

The next entry had me laughing again almost immediately.

Autumn tried to teach me how to bake today. It was terrifying.

I glanced at Riley. "I was a good teacher."

He looked doubtful. "Were you?"

"Yes."

I read on.

She kept saying things like "you'll know when it looks right." I asked what right looked like. She said, "Right." This is not teaching. This is witchcraft.

I smiled.

She got flour on her nose and didn't notice for twenty minutes. I did not tell her because it improved morale.

I gasped.

Also because she was yelling at me about measuring vanilla with my heart.

I stared at the page. "You dumped half the bottle in."

Riley frowned. "Did I?"

"Yes."

"Maybe my heart was generous."

"Your heart was expensive."

He laughed.

The entry continued.

Cookies turned out good. Probably because Autumn panicked halfway through and took over. I have been demoted to bowl holder. I accept this position with honor.

I smiled so hard my cheeks hurt.

The next page had a drawing of me standing in his kitchen wearing an apron, one hand on my hip, hair escaping its bun. Riley had drawn himself beside me as a tiny stick figure holding a bowl like a servant.

Underneath, he had written:

My career in baking.

I laughed again.

The journal kept unfolding pieces of us that weren't dramatic enough to become stories but were too precious to be nothing. There was an entry about the time I forced Riley to help me make a playlist for a road trip that never happened. He had written that I rejected every song he suggested because apparently my soul needed "autumnal yearning" and his music taste had "the emotional depth of a toaster." Then he wrote:

She was right about three of my songs, which I will never admit aloud.

There was one about me making him watch a nature documentary because I wanted to see the arctic foxes, only for him to get invested in a completely different animal and spend the rest of the night sending me facts I didn't ask for.

There was one about a school project where he claimed I became "a tiny dictator with access to poster board." There was an entire paragraph about how I could not be trusted with a hot glue gun after what he called "the pinecone incident."

I had no memory of the pinecone incident.

That worried me.

Then I turned to a page that had been folded at the corner.

Autumn asked me today if I think we'll still be friends when we're old.

My chest tightened.

I said no. Obviously by then I'll have escaped.

I rolled my eyes through sudden tears.

She threw a pillow at me. Then she asked again.

Of course I had.

I told her yes.

My hand stilled.

I don't know what my life looks like when I'm old. I don't know where I'll live or who I'll marry or if I'll still be taking pictures or if my knees will betray me the way Dad says they will. But I know Autumn will be somewhere in the story, probably yelling at me for something I did in 2016.

A tear fell onto the page, and I quickly wiped it away before it could smear the ink.

I think some people are less like chapters and more like punctuation. You don't always notice them, but the whole thing reads differently without them. Autumn is probably a comma. Small. Dramatic. Always interrupting me.

I choked on a laugh.

Riley smiled.

But necessary. Unfortunately.

I laughed again, wiping my face with the sleeve of my sweater. "You couldn't just let it be nice."

Riley's voice was gentle. "Apparently not."

"No."

I turned the page.

The final entry was longer.

The date made my chest tighten. It was from two weeks before the accident. I didn't know if I wanted to read it.

Riley noticed my pause. "What?"

I swallowed. "This one is close to..."

He understood. The smile faded from his face. "You don't have to."

I looked down at the page.

Maybe I didn't. But the journal was in my hands now. These words had been written by the Riley who remembered me. The Riley who was still drowning in ways I hadn't seen. The Riley who had loved me as his best friend and hidden the rest of himself behind jokes.

I needed to know.

So I read.

Autumn fell asleep on my floor again.

My breath shook.

She came over because she said her brain was too loud. She brought a blanket, two granola bars, and one of those dramatic candles she says smell like haunted forests. I told her my room smelled fine. She said my room smelled like laundry I forgot about and male despair.

A tiny laugh escaped me.

I remembered that night.

I had forgotten it until now.

Or maybe I hadn't forgotten. Maybe it had simply been buried beneath heavier things.

We didn't talk much. She just sat on my floor and read while I edited pictures. Every once in a while, she would show me a sentence and say it was pretty. I did not understand most of them. I said "that's pretty" anyway because I am supportive and brave.

I smiled through tears.

She fell asleep around midnight. She looked uncomfortable, but when I tried to wake her up, she told me to stop being mean and went back to sleep.

I had done that. Definitely.

I put a blanket over her. She stole my pillow in her sleep. This is who she is as a person.

I laughed softly.

Then the handwriting shifted.

Not much. But enough that I noticed.

Sometimes I wonder what my life would have been like if I hadn't met her.

My chest tightened.

Quieter, probably.

I smiled sadly.

Cleaner. Less dramatic. With more fries.

I rolled my eyes.

But worse.

My tears came back.

Definitely worse.

I pressed the heel of my hand against my chest.

I don't think Autumn understands how much space she takes up in a person's life. Not in a bad way. She just becomes part of everything. Part of your house. Part of your family. Part of your routines. Part of the way you think about yourself.

I could barely see the words.

She is annoying in the way sunlight is annoying when you're trying to sleep. Too bright. Too warm. Impossible to ignore.

A laugh broke through my tears.

And then, when it's gone, everything is cold.

I stopped breathing.

Riley had written that two weeks before the accident. Two weeks before I told him I loved him. Two weeks before he rejected me gently. Two weeks before the crash.

My fingers trembled.

I hope she never reads this because she'll never let me live down the sunlight thing.

My tears slipped down my face.

But it's true.

I looked at Riley. He was staring at me now, wide awake, silent.

I read the last lines.

Autumn is my best friend. My Juliet. My emergency contact for emotional stupidity. My fry thief. My future best woman against her will. My person.

I closed the journal.

"You were mean. So mean."

"A lot?" Riley asked.

"So much."

"Good."

"And sweet."

He looked uncertain. "Yeah?"

"Yeah." I smiled through the last of my tears. "You were my best friend."

Riley stared at me for a long time. Then he whispered, "I wish I remembered loving you like that."

My heart cracked.

I looked down at the journal. Then at him.

"Maybe you don't have to remember it all at once."

His eyes searched mine.

"Maybe," I said softly, "you can just read it and know it was real."

Riley nodded slowly.

The house downstairs began to stir. Someone laughed. A door opened. Milo shouted something about vampires. Hudson shouted back about cursed gingerbread. The quiet was ending.

The families were waking.

Halloween was beginning.

I wiped my face one more time and placed the journal carefully on the bed between us.

Riley looked down at it. Then at me.

"So," he said softly, "did I really call you a comma?"

I stared at him.

Then I laughed. A real laugh.

"Yes."

His mouth curved. "That feels rude."

"It was."

"Accurate?"

I picked up the pillow again.

"Do you want to survive Halloween?"

He raised both hands, smiling, and for a few seconds, the ache in my chest loosened. Not disappeared. Not healed. Just loosened.

Because the journal had given me a thousand tiny proofs that Riley Briarwyn had loved Autumn Jenkins with his whole stupid, sarcastic, loyal heart.