Chapter 53 – Exhaustion

• Jesse is really nice to me for the rest of the morning, slinging his arm around my shoulders and cracking jokes all the way to breakfast. Even I can’t help laughing, even as a deep pool of dread forms in my stomach, because I have absolutely no control over how Luca is going to react to any of this.
• My mind keeps running through scenarios – is he going to storm in demanding answers? Is he going to declare to the entire Hall that I’m a girl? Is he going to just pull me aside and –
• “Hey,” Jesse says, using the arm around my shoulder to tug me incrementally closer. “Whatever it is, Ari? It can’t be that bad.”