Chapter 8

As Alexander was taken away, he snarled at Sophia, "You think he really loves you? He knew everything all along! He just waited to watch you make a fool of yourself!"

After the police cars disappeared, the beach fell into dead silence.

Sophia stared at me blankly. "You… knew all along?"

"Since the first time you accused me because of him." I gazed out at the dark sea. "When the nineteen-year-old version of you appeared, she confirmed what I already suspected—that Alexander had been playing you."

"Then why didn't you fight harder? Why didn't you shake me, scream at me, force me to see?"

"Because you had to see it yourself. Love isn't about forcing someone to believe you. It's about waiting—even when waiting destroys you."

She pressed her hands against her temples, the restored memories crashing through her mind like a flood breaching a dam.

"I remember now," she breathed. "The shooting star. I wished to see the future. And I saw… I saw myself doing terrible things to you."

"That's why you asked for three chances."

"I thought if I warned myself in advance—if I gave you a safety net—I could prevent it." Her voice broke. "But I forgot everything the next morning. And the future I feared became the present I created."

The waves rolled in. Cold. Indifferent.

"James, the things Alexander sent you—the photos, the videos—"

"I deleted them."

"But you saw—"

"I saw. And I'll carry that. But I won't use it against you."

She looked at me with an expression I hadn't seen in years. Not the coldness of the woman at Marlen Tower. Not the fury of the celebrity who'd forgotten her roots.

It was the face of the nineteen-year-old girl in the thirty-dollar dress, seeing me for the first time.

"I don't deserve another chance," she said.

"No," I agreed. "You don't."

The honesty cut us both.

"But you once asked me for three, and I gave them. What you do now isn't about chances. It's about who you choose to be from here."

She wiped her face with her sleeve—an old habit, from before the fame, before the designer clothes.

"I choose to be someone who deserves the subway rides," she whispered.

I didn't respond. I wasn't sure those words meant anything anymore.

But I took the watch from her hand, buckled it back onto my wrist, and walked to my car alone.