YARA
I don't see much of Dean in the days after the dance. He keeps to himself, out with Beau on some errand or another most mornings, and when we do cross paths at dinner, he's careful, polite, distant in a way that feels deliberate, like a man putting a wall back up brick by brick after letting it fall for one reckless song.
That morning at breakfast, I hear his voice out in the hallway before I see him, unhurried, answering some question of Beau's about fence lines, and my whole body goes still and listening before my mind has caught up to why. I don't even realize I've stopped buttering my toast until Nola asks if something's wrong with it.
I tell myself it's better this way. I don't believe myself very well. My hands don't believe it either. They keep finding the edge of my sleeve,
