Blue called Gansey. He picked up at once. “I wasn’t sleeping.” “I know,” she replied. “Come get me.”

Ronan finished with, “For the love of … Parrish, take some care, this is not your mother’s 1971 Honda Civic.” Adam lifted his head and said, “They didn’t start making the Civic until ’73.”

He used to wonder what he would have looked like if he had grown up in a place like this. Now he thought about how, if he wanted it, he could one day live in a place like this. He did not quite understand what had changed.

Adam watched how intently Ronan studied the seams, his eyelashes low over his light eyes. Ronan let out a breath, put the model down on the bed beside him, and kissed Adam.

Then Ronan was out of sight and speeding on his way back to Monmouth Manufacturing. In the rearview mirror, he allowed himself the slightest of smiles. This was what it felt like to be happy.

"What the hell’s wrong with your eyes?” Ronan asked. Adam’s pupils were still tiny. “Takes me a while to come back.” “Creepy bastard.”

“Adam thinks he saw an apparition at his place.” Ronan eyed Noah. “I’m seeing an apparition right now.” Noah made a rude gesture, a hilariously unthreatening act coming from him, like a growl from a kitten.

Adam never needed an invitation. He and Ronan must’ve fought. Unsurprising. If it had a social security number, Ronan had fought with it.

Part of Adam wanted to lure Ronan out of his room for company, but most of him realized that Ronan was, in his unappealing and unspoken way, grieving for Noah.

Depending on where you began the story, it was about Noah Czerny.

boys around them laughing and calling to one another, making space for the three of them because this had been a thing for so long: Gansey-Lynch-Parrish.

Ronan said, “No. The ancient Greeks didn’t have a word for blue.” Everyone at the table looked at him. “What the hell, Ronan?” said Adam.

Gansey’s ley line heart had been gifted, not grown.

Gansey grinned at them both. He was hard to resist in this form: glowing with rows and rows of white teeth, a college brochure in the making.

He had not known to be born afraid, but he’d learned.

Adam finally lifted his head. “Then you better cover my eyes.” Gansey looked puzzled. “What?” "Because,” Adam said bitterly, “otherwise they’ll betray you.”

Ronan was always saying that he never lied, but he wore a liar’s face.

“I don’t have a brother, ma’am,” Adam replied. But Blue saw his eyes dart to Gansey.

Ronan was not going to Henry Cheng’s under any circumstances. All that smiling and activism gave him a rash. Ronan was certainly going to Adam’s.

“Which one’s he again? The pretty one?” Blue and Gansey exchanged a look. Blue’s look said, 𝘐’𝘮 𝘴𝘰, 𝘴𝘰 𝘴𝘰𝘳𝘳𝘺. Gansey’s said, 𝘈𝘮 𝘐 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘱𝘳𝘦𝘵𝘵𝘺 𝘰𝘯𝘦?