JAKE POV
I know what guilt looks like on Mia.
I've seen it twice. Once when she forgot my birthday and tried to cover it with a last-minute dinner that she'd clearly planned in forty minutes. Once when she told her mom she was staying at her friend's place and spent the night with me instead, and spent the whole next morning being slightly too cheerful.
Mia guilty looks like overcompensating. Too much eye contact, then suddenly not enough. Talking faster than usual. Laughing a half-second after she should.
Walking out of that hallway, she wasn't guilty.
She was something else. Something I don't have a word for yet. Quiet in a specific way, like a person carrying something carefully, making sure not to spill it.
I noticed. I said nothing. I put my arm around her and we walked to lunch and I talked about the menu and she laughed at something I said and it was completely normal.
It was so normal it bothered me all afternoon.
His name is Ethan Cross.
