Page 102 of Dream Chaser
“Same, but not the point. No one’s disappearing. We’re just evolving.”
Lexi finally looks up. “Ooo, are we in our Pokémon phase?”
I snort. “I hope so. I want sparkles when I level up.”
Mags groans again. “I don’t want anyone to evolve. I want everyone to stay in their pre-marriage, pre-baby, pre-too-busy-to-breathe era. I want girls’ trips. I want midnight snacks and truth-or-dare games in ski lodges and summer vacations on the Cape. I want us.”
“You still have us,” Lexi says, a little softer now. “It just looks different sometimes. And one day, when we’re forty with laugh lines, and career chaos, and hopefully fewer period cramps, we’ll still have us. It’ll be brunch instead of bar crawls. It’ll be FaceTime check-ins with kids throwing waffles in the background. It’ll be real.”
Mags sits up now, squinting at us. “So what you’re saying is … I need to emotionally prepare for the end of an era.”
“I’m saying,” I counter, “it’s only an end if we stop showing up.”
Lexi grins and tips her head. “And last I checked, we never stop showing up.”
There’s a beat. A pause.
Then Mags narrows her eyes. “You’ve been different lately.”
My heart skips. “Me?”
She nods slowly. “Like … secretive. Glowy. Suspicious.”
Lexi raises a brow then hides her smirk behind her phone. “Hmm.”
I roll my eyes. “I am not glowy.”
“Youare,” Mags insists. “I’ve seen it. You’ve got … post-make-out energy.”
Lexi coughs. “Maybe she just switched to a better moisturizer.”
“Exactly,” I say quickly. “It’s all hyaluronic acid and denial.”
“And hello, the girls’ trip isn’t just rescheduling because Riley’s got a little Hart growing inside her—you’re going on a freaking reality show, Margret Sawyer,” Lexi scolds her.
Mags grumbles something unintelligible but lets it go as she sits up. “I know, I know. Also, I have to pee.”
She dramatically stomps away, and Lexi looks at me. “You good?”
“Yeah. You?”
She rolls her eyes. “Fine, but when you’re ready to have the conversation and I’m not here, it better not be a damn text or phone call. I wanna see that face when I say, I knew it, and you’re welcome.”
“Welcome for what?” I laugh.
“You know, Izzy Ross, you know.”
I already threw my bedding in after the whole smells-like-boy comments, and the laundry room is set up on the third floor, so I officially moved up from Aunt Isobel’s old room. And theybought my excuse that I slept down there for Wile. I did catch an exchanged look, but they didn’t press.
Mags is tucked in her room just next to mine, Lexi’s next to Mags in her room, and the texts stopped about an hour ago.
And now?
Now I’m alone in bed, flipping my phone between my fingers, trying not to scroll, not to check socials, not to overthink.
I fail spectacularly.
Instead, I swipe to messages and type:
