chapter 19

Everly I watch Zoe blow out her candles. Today is her twenty-first birthday and I feel blessed to call her one of my best friends, though she's more like a sister to me—Zoe and Macey fill the places where my family should have been. I'm happy with how far we've all come. We didn’t need anyone; we only needed each other. We got ourselves here. “Happy twenty-first,” I whisper to her, giving her a hug after setting the cake down. “Oh, we need napkins,” I tell her before rushing off back to the kitchen. I go into the storeroom, grab a box of refills and pull a handful out before placing the box back on the shelf. Just as I walk back out, Zoe rushes into the kitchen, her face pale and masked with a look of horror. She smacks straight into me before grabbing my arms. “What is it? What happened?” I ask, looking around for what scared her. When she doesn’t answer, I walk past her to investigate myself—it must be bad for her not to be able to tell me. Zoe fears nothing these days, she's really