Page 128 of The Pucking Date
I step out onto the back deck, the late afternoon sun low and soft across the grass. The air smells like dish soap and cut crusts.
My phone buzzes in my pocket.
Jessica. Missed call.
No voicemail this time. Just the red bubble blinking at me, waiting.
It’s the third one today.
Three missed calls. Each one a question I’m not ready to answer. Each ring another chance to choose fear or faith.
I know what the old Finn would do. The one who hunted her for months. But that man believed she’d choose him back.
This Finn isn’t sure she ever will.
My thumb hovers. I don’t write a text. I don’t call back. Not because I don’t want to.
Because I do.
That’s the worst part.
Because if I listen now, I’ll hear it in her voice. The crack. The regret. The part of her that still believes in us.
I let the screen go dark and slide the phone back into my pocket. She made a choice.
Now it’s my turn.
31
THREE MISSED CALLS
JESSICA
Ialmost left it behind.
Finn’s shirt, still folded on my dresser, soft and worn from Fire Island and too many nights pretending I was fine. It still smells like bonfire and him and the night I let myself believe we could be more.
I told myself I was done.
But I never packed it away. And maybe that’s the truth I’ve been avoiding. I never stopped hoping he’d come back for it.
Now I’m not waiting anymore. I’m going to him.
Three missed calls. No answer. No voicemail. No text. Just silence, loud, aching, and deliberate.
I stare at my phone as the Uber winds through Raleigh’s tree-lined streets. It’s beautiful here—big porches, bigger driveways, houses with histories and secrets layered into every brick.
Finn’s house rises behind iron gates—a Southern colonial wrapped in white trim, history, and more than a little guilt. I clutch the handle of my overnight bag tighter.
“Miss?” the driver says, slowing. “This the place?”
My stomach flips. “Yeah. This is it.”
I’m barely on the top step when the front door swings open. “Well, well,” comes a voice that could slice steel. “You must be the infamous Jessica Novak. In the flesh.”
A girl in her mid-twenties I recognize from that TikTok—Finn’s sister, Aoife—leans against the doorframe. Her arms are crossed. Her expression is not impressed. She looks like Finn—if Finn had better cheekbones and no patience for bullshit.
“Hi, Aoife,” I say carefully.
