"Is what true?"
I hear myself say it before I've decided to, my voice coming out steadier than I feel, which is the only mercy in this entire moment. Jess is looking at me like I'm a headline she's about to get to publish, and Ryan beside me has gone very quiet in a way that feels louder than anything he could actually say.
"That you two are—" Jess does something with her eyebrows that fills in the blank better than words would.
"We met yesterday," I say, flat, final, the kind of sentence designed to close a door rather than open one. "I moved in yesterday. So no. Whatever you heard, it's not that."
It's not technically a lie. That's the only thing keeping my hands from shaking.
Jess's face flickers — disappointment, mostly, the specific disappointment of someone who was hoping for a
