Who We Were

The first person Lennon Hales ever loved died.
The second will teach her that death isn't the only way to lose someone.

At eighteen, Lennon arrives at Texas A&M with a scholarship, a promise to her mother, and no idea how to build a future in a world that kept moving after hers stopped.

Kai Calloway is everything she should avoid.

Star quarterback. Number twelve. A boy with thousands of people screaming his name and a future everyone can see.

Except no one sees what it costs him to keep living it.

Lennon does.

What begins between them should have been nothing.

Instead, Kai makes Lennon remember what it feels like to want something after loss, and Lennon becomes the one person who makes Kai believe he might deserve a life beyond his guilt.

There is only one problem.

Before Kai knew her laugh, her grief, or how easily she would fit against him-

he had already done something that could make her hate him.

And the longer he waits to tell her, the more real everything becomes.

The kisses.
The secrets.
The borrowed jerseys.
The terrifying relief of finding home in another person.

Because some lies disappear when the truth comes out.

Others grow roots, wrapping themselves around every beautiful thing that came after until there is no way to tear them out without destroying everything with them.

By the time the truth reaches Lennon, Kai isn't just the boy who hurt her.

He's the boy she loves.

And losing someone to death leaves you with memories.

Losing someone who is still alive leaves you questioning whether any of them were real.

Lennon and Kai were supposed to be temporary.

Instead, they became the kind of people who divide a life into two halves-

who you were before them,
and who you had to become after.