Minutes passed, and no one came upstairs.

Maybe Willow and Kai were still reading the first journal. Maybe Lydia was keeping Milo distracted. Maybe they had heard enough through the quiet of the house to understand that whatever had happened in Riley's bedroom was not something either of us was ready to carry downstairs yet. Maybe they simply thought we needed time.

They were right.

Neither of us moved from the floor. Riley sat with his back against the side of his bed, and I sat across from him with my knees tucked beneath me, our hands still caught between us like neither of us knew how to let go. His fingers were warm around mine. Mine were still trembling a little, though not as badly as before. Every so often, his thumb moved across my knuckles in a slow, careful line, and every time he did it, something inside my chest loosened and broke at the exact same time.

I knew he didn't remember. I knew the boy sitting in front of me didn't remember the empty hallway when I was sixteen or the bathroom floors or the way he used to know I was panicking before I did. He didn't remember all the nights he held my hand between both of his and helped me breathe until the world stopped spinning. He didn't remember that this was ours.

But my heart did.

My heart remembered enough for both of us.

And because of that, I couldn't make myself move.

It felt too much like the past. Too much like old Riley. My Riley. The Riley who knew exactly how to hold my shaking hands and exactly how to sit with me through silence without trying to fill it.

It was the closest I had felt to him since the accident, and I was terrified that if I shifted even slightly, the moment would vanish. He might let go. He might stand. He might remember he didn't know me the way I knew him. He might become the careful, confused boy in the hospital bed again, and this tiny, fragile piece of the life we used to have would disappear.

So I stayed.

I barely breathed.

The journal was still on the floor a few feet away, open where it had fallen. I tried not to look at it, but every now and then my eyes drifted there anyway. Those pages had changed everything. The accident was not what we thought it was. The grief I had been carrying had suddenly grown teeth. It was no longer only the pain of Riley forgetting me. It was the pain of realizing I had been losing him long before the crash, and I had not known.

Riley had stopped crying a while ago, but his face still looked different. Pale. Tired. Haunted by a version of himself he could not reach. He stared down at our joined hands like they made more sense than anything else in the room.

"I don't know what to do with this," he whispered.

His voice was so quiet I almost thought I imagined it.

"With what?"

He looked toward the journal. "With him."

I swallowed.

The answer mattered too much to rush.

"You don't have to do anything with him tonight."

His eyes moved back to mine.

"He's me."

"Yes," I said softly. "But he's also a version of you who was hurting and alone and didn't know how to tell anyone."

Riley's jaw tightened.

"I don't remember being him."

"I know."

"What if I never do?"

The question settled between us.

I looked down at our hands.

"Then we'll still take care of you now."

His fingers tightened around mine.

I didn't know if that was the right thing to say. I didn't know if there was a right thing to say after something like this. All I knew was that he looked like he had inherited a tragedy from himself and had no idea where to put it.

For a long time after that, we were quiet again.

The house softened around us. At some point, the golden afternoon light that had been spilling through his window began to fade. Shadows stretched across the bedroom floor, touching the corners of the bed, the desk, the bookshelf, the wall of photographs. The little string lights above the pictures were off, but the photographs still caught what remained of the day, small flashes of paper and memory glowing dimly in the room.

I didn't realize how late it had gotten until the light turned blue.

My body noticed before my mind did. Exhaustion crept in slowly, settling into my shoulders and behind my eyes. My knees hurt from sitting on the floor too long, and my back ached, but I still didn't move.

Because Riley was still holding my hand.

Because he had not let go.

Because part of me was afraid that this was a dream, and if I shifted, I would wake up back in the hospital room where he looked at me and asked who I was.

I wondered if his family was worried. I wondered why no one had checked on us. Then I wondered if maybe Willow had walked halfway up the stairs, heard the silence, and turned back around because mothers knew when silence was not empty. Maybe Lydia had wanted to come up and Kai had stopped her. Maybe Milo had asked too many questions.

I didn't know.

I had no idea how many minutes had passed. Maybe thirty. Maybe two hours. Time had become strange.

Then my phone buzzed.

The sound made both of us jump.

Riley's hand tightened around mine before he realized what it was.

My heart stuttered.

He looked at my pocket.

I looked at his face.

For one ridiculous second, neither of us moved, like the phone had interrupted something sacred and we were both offended by it.

It buzzed again.

I finally pulled my hand from one of his, though he still held the other. My fingers felt cold the second his palm was no longer around them.

I took my phone from my pocket and looked at the screen.

Mom.

Of course.

She was probably calling to tell me to come home. Or to ask where I was. Or to remind me that I had left hours ago with nothing but a granola bar and a heart full of bad decisions.

I stared at her name.

Then I looked at Riley.

"I should answer."

He nodded, but he still didn't let go of my hand.

So I answered with one hand.

"Hi, Mom."

"Autumn?" Her voice was gentle, but worried. "Are you still at Riley's?"

I closed my eyes. "Yeah."

"Sweetheart, it's getting dark."

I looked toward the window.

She was right.

"I know."

"Are you okay?"

I looked at Riley again.

He looked exhausted.

Lost.

Still holding onto me.

"No," I whispered before I could stop myself.

Mom went quiet. Then her voice softened. "Do you need me to come get you?"

I looked down at our hands.

Riley's thumb moved once over my knuckles.

Slow. Careful.

Familiar.

My throat tightened.

"Not yet."

Riley's eyes lifted to mine.

I didn't look away.

"Okay," Mom said softly. "Not yet."

I breathed in shakily. "I'll call you when I'm ready."

"You promise?"

"Yeah."

"And Autumn?"

"Yeah?"

"You don't have to carry whatever happened there by yourself."

My eyes burned.

I looked toward the journal on the floor.

Riley followed my gaze.

"I know," I said, though I wasn't sure I believed it yet.

Mom was quiet for a moment, as if she knew there was more but wouldn't force me to say it. "I love you."

"I love you too."

I hung up slowly and lowered the phone into my lap.

Riley watched me. "She wants you to go home."

"Eventually."

"Do you want to?"

I looked at him.

No.

Yes.

I didn't know.

I wanted to stay in this room forever and never look at that journal again. I wanted to run downstairs and tell Willow and Kai everything. I wanted to go home and crawl into my bed. I wanted to go back in time four days and answer Riley's silence differently. I wanted old Riley. I wanted new Riley. I wanted the impossible.

"I don't want to leave you with this," I said.

His face changed.

"You don't have to stay because you feel bad."

"That's not why I'm staying."

"Then why?"

I stared at our hands.

"Because I know what it feels like to panic alone."

Riley didn't answer.

I swallowed. "And because you didn't let me do it."

His eyes dropped to our hands too.

"I don't remember that."

"I know."

"But I did?"

I nodded. "All the time."

He was quiet for a while. Then he whispered, "I'm glad."

A tear slipped down my cheek. I wiped it quickly, but he saw. Of course he saw.

He looked at the journal again. "They need to know."

My chest tightened. "Yeah."

"I don't know how to tell them."

"I know."

"Will you..." He stopped.

I waited.

His hand tightened around mine.

"Will you stay when I do?"

My answer came immediately. "Yes."

Relief moved through his face so quickly that it almost broke me. "Okay."

"But not tonight," I said gently.

He looked at me.

"Not like this. Not when you're exhausted. Not when they're downstairs reading the other journal and thinking they got pieces of you back."

His eyes filled again. "I don't want to hurt them."

"I know."

"I already did."

"No."

"Autumn."

"No," I said more firmly, even though my voice shook. "You were hurting. That matters too."

He looked down. "I don't know if I believe that."

"Then I'll believe it until you can."

The room went quiet again.

Riley stared at me for a long time, and I wondered what he saw. A girl he had known for less than a week. A girl who knew his bedroom better than he did. A girl who had read the worst pages of a journal he didn't remember writing and still stayed on the floor with him afterward.

"I think I understand why I trusted you," he whispered.

My heart hurt. "You do?"

He nodded, eyes still on mine.

"I think so."

I wanted to tell him that old Riley didn't trust me with everything. Not this. Not the journal. Not the sadness. But maybe that wasn't the point. Maybe trust wasn't always handing someone every broken piece before you shattered. Maybe sometimes trust was what happened after. Maybe it was letting someone sit beside you in the wreckage and not asking them to leave.

The phone in my lap went dark.

Outside, the last light slipped away.

Downstairs, someone laughed softly. Milo, maybe. Then Lydia said something too quiet to hear, and Willow answered.

Life continued below us.

Warm. Unaware.

For a little while longer, anyway.

Riley leaned his head back against the bed and closed his eyes. He still held my hand.

I let him.

I stayed on the floor beside him until the room turned completely dark, until my legs went numb and my heart stopped racing, until the moment no longer felt like something I had to protect by staying perfectly still.

Eventually, I knew we would have to move. Eventually, we would have to stand up and walk downstairs. Eventually, Riley would have to decide what to do with the journal on the floor.

Eventually, the truth would leave this room.

But not yet.

For now, Riley held my hand the way he used to.

And I let myself pretend, just for a little while, that memory had nothing to do with it.