Page 100 of High Hopes

Her jaw drops. “Are you kidding me?”

I shake my head, the grin still plastered to my face. “Not even a little. I left her a voicemail this morning, and she called me back to offer the job.”

“Oh my God, Birdie!” She practically launches herself onto the couch next to me, grabbing my arm and shaking it. “That’s huge. You’re going to be, like, the next big thing. I’ll get to say I knew you when!”

“Please,” I laugh, swatting her away. “This is not the life of the rich and famous.”

“Not yet,” she says, wagging a finger at me. “But this is where it starts. Paid work, access to the studio, commissions—Birdie, this is everything.”

“It really is.”

“Does Liam know yet?” she asks, flopping back against the couch cushions and beaming at me.

“Not yet,” I say, tucking my phone into my lap. “I’ll tell him later. I just . . . I needed to sit with it for a minute, you know? Let it feel real.”

She gives me a knowing smile. “I get it, and you deserve this, B. You really, really do.”

I glance around the room—the flickering candles, the faint curl of incense smoke, Sena perched cross-legged like the little hedge witch she is—and I feel a tightness in my chest that isn’t fear or sadness. It’s gratitude.

“Thank you,” I murmur, letting my head drop back against the cushions as the moment settles over me. It’s strange how much I suddenly believe it. That I deserve this, all of it. The good things, the small wins, the chance to build something from the brokenness.

I’m not just surviving. I’m starting to live again.

It’s late—almostten—and the campus studio is empty, save for me and the giant eight-pound monstrosity I’ve been working with for the past hour.

I exhale through my nose, pressing my ribbon tool into the spinning mass on the wheel. “Come on,” I murmur to it, my voice low, coaxing. “Work with me here.”

It’s almost meditative, the way I work—tools trimming, fingers coaxing, a quiet give-and-take between me and the clay. My jeans are streaked with gray smudges, my sweater sleeves rolled up past my elbows, and I’ve already pushed my hair back three times.

I’ve missed this feeling. The quiet focus, hands deep in the grit of something I can control. My spark is back—that little drive that pushes me to sit here for hours on end, spinning and shaping until my back aches and my hands feel raw.

It’s funny how one phone call could change everything. Claire’s voice, so certain, so sure, still rings in my ears:I think you have real potential. I told my dad the next day, and for the first time in a year, his voice was thick with something other than worry-laced caution. Pride. He said he wants to shake hands with Claire himself, like she’d done him a personal favor.

And Liam—oh God. I didn’t even get to finish telling him before he spun me around the kitchen like I’d just won the lottery, his laughter loud and reckless, his smile so big it made me dizzy. “I told you, Birdie. I told you you’d get there.”

That moment, the pure joy in his face—it stuck with me, wedged somewhere warm and unshakable inside my chest. It’s been fueling me ever since. My hands are steady, my focus sharpas I carefully apply my trimming tool to the nearly finished piece.

I’m so absorbed in the work that I don’t hear the footsteps until they stop a few feet away.

“Don’t let me interrupt the magic.”

I jolt, my hands slipping slightly, and glance up. Liam stands near the door, his hair damp from practice, wearing sweatpants and a Dayton Soccer hoodie. Just as handsome and effortlessly self-assured as the day we met but somehow even more familiar now—like he belongs here.

“How long have you been standing there?” I ask.

“Long enough to know you talk to clay when you think no one’s watching,” he teases.

“I’m coaxing it,” I reply defensively. “It’s called encouragement.”

“Sure.” He raises an eyebrow, still grinning. “Does it ever talk back?”

“Only when you’re not here to scare it into silence,” I shoot back, rolling my eyes as I focus on the wheel again.

Liam pulls out one of the old wooden stools from under a nearby table, the legs scraping against the concrete floor as he drags it closer. He sits, leaning his elbows on his knees as he studies me.

“I didn’t think you’d still be here,” he says after a moment, his tone softer now. “You didn’t answer my text.”

“Phone’s over there,” I say, jerking my head toward the far corner where my bag sits, abandoned. “I needed a break from screens.”

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