What the…

His face is serious as he leans in. “You and I both know you believe the vision really happened.”

I hold a finger up. “One, stop mimicking my finger thing. It’s mine and you’re stealing it.”

He chuckles. “Just imitating the best.”

“And, to be clear, I was in a coma for two days, I was fifteen, and I’d just watched my dad die. Of course I’m going to dream about him.” I take another bite, pretending he isn’t messing with my head. “What is up with you today?”

He rubs his eyes. “I don’t know. That class…and Anastasia didn’t seem like herself—”

My fork clatters down to my plate. “Must we talk about her?”

He snaps his mouth shut and studies my expression searchingly.

Dammit. “Look, you, Crew, Hollis, and my family are the only ones who know about my dad thing. It makes me sound like a wacko, and I already…” think about it constantly.

My chest tightens and I rub it, an image of my father popping into my head.

We’d been to a football game, just me and him, when our truck skidded on wet pavement, hit an embankment, and slide off into a ravine. The road was notoriously curvy and rural, and he wasn’t speeding, but a deer ran across in front of us. I awoke in the car and found him slumped over the steering wheel. I suffered a broken leg, a ruptured spleen and kidney, and a head injury. I was lucky. His side of the truck collided with a boulder, the jagged edges piercing the windshield, and my dad’s face. Bones protruding. Blood everywhere. Carnage.

Pinned in by the seatbelt, I begged him to hang on, to not leave me…

My breath hitches and I dip my face away from Benji’s prying eyes.

But the dream? Shit.

He walked into my hospital room, sat down next to me, and took my hand. He looked like he always did. Tall, brown hair, hazel eyes. He smelled of his cologne. He smiled and told me everything was going to be okay. He said I was the best son. He told me I was going to make him proud and that he’d always be with me.

In my dream, I wept. And wept. Please stay, Dad, please don’t go.

Then he faded away.

Defining moment? Hell yeah.

Life is just one breath away from death. Every single motherfucking second counts.

“It was special to you,” Benji murmurs quietly.

My fingers pick up my fork, a lump in my throat. “It doesn’t make it real. Anastasia was my sister’s favorite princess movie. Mom made jokes about it. It. Was. A. Weird. Dream.”

He steals a noodle and pops it in his mouth. “Okay, okay, I’ll shut up about it. But, let me say this—”

“You just can’t let it go.”

“I did some googling—”

“Dude. Not everything you read on the internet is true.”

“—and found this piece about dreams from dead people, like, it could be real. When you’re asleep—or in a coma—it shuts down your critical thinking and leaves your brain open—”

“To make believe. You’re talking hocus-pocus crap.”

“No. Seriously. What if it was his way of comforting you? Like a piece of his soul connected with you. Didn’t that experience ease you? Didn’t it make you feel better—in that moment?”

“You’re the woo-woo one,” I say as I go back to eating.

“I’m a psych major. This is possible.”

“You should look into mystic mediums. Or one of those call-in places.” I mimic making a phone call. “Hello, Mystical Benji, can you let me talk to my dead parakeet?”

“Ah, man, you had to bring up Roscoe. You know I loved that parakeet.”

“Who’s got a parakeet?” Hollis says as he breezes into the kitchen from outside with Crew and drops his book bag. “I wanna see it. I want to teach it some bad words.” He cocks his head. “Definitely teach it to say Hollis is a badass motherfucker.”

“True that. I need some funny,” Crew grouses. “If someone brings the game up one more time, I’m going ballistic.”

I relay the story about the reporter I saw, and they growl and mutter. The three of us just want to forget this season ever happened.

“Benji wants a new bird,” I say a bit later. “His childhood one passed away last month.”

Benji grimaces. “I should have been there when Roscoe died. He was alone with my mom and brother, but no Benji.” He exhales. “I have an idea: let’s get one for the house and name her Adele in honor of Hollis’s performance last night in karaoke.”

Hollis flips us off then stares at my plate, eyes lighting up. “Who made food and where can I get some?”

“I ate the last of it,” I say. “Payback for the Ding Dongs you keep hidden.”

Crew eyes me and Benji. “So, did we interrupt a talk? You guys looked serious.”

I jump up from the table, rinse my dish, and toss it in the dishwasher. “Nope.”

But I can still feel Benji’s gaze on me.

Sure. I’ve analyzed the dream with my mom. She thinks it was real. So does my sister. But it’s because we want to cling to the hope that there’s an afterlife and Dad’s still with us in some way. People die. They don’t visit you in dreams. Right?

“Hey guys!” comes a female voice, and I turn to see Harper Michaels standing in the kitchen. She’s slipping a blue sweater on and picking up her book bag from where it’s hanging on one of the hooks near the door.

Petite, blonde, and pretty, she’s Donovan’s ex.

She used to spend every free moment here with him when they dated—but not anymore.

“Hey,” Benji says cautiously.

Crew and Hollis send her a wave, but they aren’t smiling.

Her face is flushed, and she won’t meet any of our gazes. “Gotta go. See you Friday at the party,” she tells us as she dashes out the back door.

Weird.

I look at Benji. He’s been at the house the longest. “How long has she been here?”

He lifts his hands. “I got here an hour ago and no one has come in, so she’s been here a while.”

There’s a silence in the kitchen as the guys look at each other, then at me.

Crew arches a brow, like, Dude, what are you going to do about that?

Hollis grimaces. “Is he messing around with her?”

We all know who he is.

Anastasia isn’t part of the fraternity brotherhood officially, but she’s wearing his pin, and that makes her one of our little sisters. Not as important as a brother, sure, and girlfriends with pins come and go, but…

A long exhalation comes from my chest. If Donovan—

“Where is he?” I ask.

“His Tesla is parked on the street, so he’s definitely here,” Hollis says.

“Basement probably,” Benji adds as he stands and peeks into the den.

“Later,” I tell them and walk through the den, saying hi to the guys there. I make a point to check on them, especially the pledges. I ask how their day is going, though I’m only half-listening, my mind lasered in on Harper and why she was here. After fifteen minutes, my finger is twisting my ring furiously as I take the stairs down to the basement.

I step down into the spacious bottom floor of our four-story house. The walls are dark paneling with photo collages of every year, various awards we’ve gotten for service work, and candid pictures of the football team. Hollis, Crew, and I are framed in one from last year after we won the national championship, our arms draped around each other. Seeing it reminds me of how fucked this season was, and I turn away.