I Hope This Doesn’t Find You

by Ann Liang

“I’ll give you the medal as a present,” he says, already turning around. “Just wait.”

“Consider it compensation for all the awards I’ve taken from you.”

“All of this is to say that Julius is lovely,” I say quickly. “And Sadie is the light of my life,” Julius says, his lip curling, even though there’s an odd note to his tone. Something that could be confused for sincerity. “The sun in my sky, the source of all my joy. She’s the reason I wake up every morning excited to go to my classes. Not a day goes by where I’m not grateful that she exists, that she’s there, that I get to talk to her and pass her in the halls and listen to her laugh.”

“Close, but no. If we die, that’s very inconvenient for them. If we hook up, that’s both inconvenient and awkward for them.” I’m pretty sure all my organs stop functioning. “What—” “When I say we, I obviously don’t mean—us,” he clarifies, and despite the taunting note in his voice, his cheeks turn red. He’s blushing, I realize. It’s so bizarre. So unlike him. It’s a visible weakness, and I quietly file it away for later use.

And he actually demonstrates, reaching out across the tight space and brushing a stray strand of hair behind my ear, his cool fingertips grazing my skin. It’s such a small, brief motion, the lightest touch. It’s pathetic that I would even notice it. But I feel a sharp pang echo through my ribs, so intense it almost resembles pain. My whole body overreacts as if I’m in mortal danger, my heartbeat thudding faster and faster until I can’t stand it. I squeeze my eyes shut against the emotion, and when I open them again, he’s staring at me, his jaw strained.

“I—don’t see your point,” I manage, my voice too loud. His brows rise, his hand still lingering above my ear. “You don’t?” It requires an incredible amount of strength just to speak. “No. And—” I push down the odd lump in my throat. Do my best to sound as flippant as possible. “I think you’re not giving our—peers enough credit. They have some discipline, you know. It’s not like they’re going to try and sneak off into the cabins to make out just because the view’s pretty and someone touched their hair—” “Not even if they did this?” he asks quietly, and he leans forward. All at once he’s too close, overwhelmingly close. I’m frozen to the spot as he pauses on purpose, his mouth bare inches from the base of my neck, so I can feel his breath trembling against my skin. “Do you need me to demonstrate further?”

“How can you be so—so callous?” I demand. “I’m not callous. You’re just soft.”

“Why are you making this so hard, Julius? Didn’t you hear the principal? The second we finish this proposal, the torture will stop and we’ll be released from each other at last. We won’t even have to speak to each other ever again.” A strange look crosses his face. “I know that.” “Then—” “Let’s choose this place,” he says, the humor gone from his tone. He points at a lakeside location I’d picked and he’d dismissed because he found the welcome message on their home page suspiciously friendly. I blink. “Really? That’s— You agree?” “Yeah. Sure.” He stands up and grabs his coffee cup, all without looking at me. And even though I should be glad we’ve ticked off our final task, gladder still to be rid of him, I feel more like I’ve missed a step on the stairs. Before I can put a finger on it, he turns around on his way out and says only, “Congratulations, Sadie. The torture is over.”

The torture is over. These are the last words Julius speaks to me in over a month.

Julius Gong is standing in the entrance. He’s still wearing his school uniform, but he’s discarded his blazer, and his tie is undone, hanging loose over his white button-down shirt. He looks different, for a reason I can’t quite place my finger on. Maybe it’s his stance. Or the crease between his brows. The shadows under his eyes.

After ten minutes of this, I lose my patience. “Are you here to select bread or a future wife? What’s taking so long?” His smile is sharp, taunting. “The latter.”

“He’s into you,” Max remarks from behind me. I startle. “Excuse me?” “He kept looking over at you,” he says with a little grin. “At least thirty times. I counted.”

“I don’t ever let her do anything,” Julius snaps, and even in the dim light, I can make out the shape of his knuckles when he clenches his fists. “She’s smart, okay? She’s a formidable force. She does everything she sets her mind to and nothing can stand in her way. Not even me.”

“What I was saying is that despite how annoying Julius is, and how vain, and cowardly, and insincere, everyone who’s met him knows he’s destined for great things. Through sheer stubbornness and manipulation, he’ll find a way to make great things come to him.”

I can’t stop thinking about him. It’s mortifying. Unproductive. Unnatural. And quite frankly, it’s really enraging. He has no right to occupy this much space inside my head.

“Like in the mornings, when I’m about to enter the classroom, I do . . . wonder about him. My heart speeds up, and I’m irrationally angry when I do see him, but on days when he’s not there, I’m also disappointed. And every now and then—just like every few minutes or so—I might be curious about what he’s doing. And after we talk, I always go back and overanalyze everything he’s said, and what I’ve said. I want to leave a good impression. I want to be better than him, but I also want to impress him . . .”

How do you know if your blood pressure is rising because of how annoying they are, or how attractive you find them? If your hands are shaking because you’re holding back from strangling them, or kissing them?”

“All fond memories, yes,” I say. “I remember clearly. But . . .” But I also remember the softness of his blazer around my shoulders. The look on his face tonight, the quick violence in his voice when his brother spoke of me. His breathing, quiet beside me, as he swept confetti from the floor after the party. His hands, firm but warm around my wrists after the race. The shine of the medal, the light in his eyes, the curve of his lips. So beautiful and infuriating and confusing. So ready to split me open with a single word, stitch me up again with a fleeting touch.

Evidence like: He ran the race for me when I felt like I was dying. Like: He stayed behind with me after the party, and he’s never shown any particular interest in sweeping floors before, so there must have been another reason. Like: Max said so when he came into the bakery after school, and didn’t his brother say that he’d been searching for our bakery? Like: There was a very brief moment four and a half weeks ago when he gazed over at me so tenderly I felt my breath catch.

“This wouldn’t have happened if we were on the same team,” I say. I mean for it to sound like an angry jibe, an accusation, but my voice decides to be a traitor and wavers violently. His gaze swivels to me. He studies my face for a long time. Too long. “You’ve never wanted to be on my team before.” I wring the water from my hair, twist it a few more times than necessary, just for something to preoccupy my body with. “I would have liked the option.”

But all I can get out is, “You’re so mean to me.” It’s laughable. Pathetic. It’s an exchange between children on the playground. It’s not what I meant to say, not at all, but something about it unravels me. My anger abandons me, my last remaining weapon against him dropped, and I press my lips together to stop them from trembling. Blink rapidly to stop the tears from falling. His expression morphs into something else at once. He jerks back, his brows furrowed. Lifts a hand, the aim unclear. “Sadie,” he says. Tentative. Tender, even. “I—I didn’t mean to—” “Start paddling,” I say stiffly. “We should go back.” Then I duck my head so he can’t see me cry.

Julius Gong is dead to me, I vow silently. If I think about him again— If I so much as look at him, then I deserve to be pelted with ice. • • • I deserve to be pelted with ice.

I study his features carefully, hungrily, like I’m piecing together a puzzle. I can’t prevent myself from drinking in the sight of him. From hating him and wanting him all at the same time, one point of tension bleeding into the other until it’s impossible to separate the two.

“It’s horrible,” I continue furiously. “It’s revolting how much I care about him. Even now. I shouldn’t want this. I shouldn’t want him.” Her jaw drops farther, her gaze catching on something behind me. “Um, Sadie—” But I’m too angry to stop. “Out of all the people in this school, it somehow has to be the one person who called me up just to taunt me when I had a fever and missed out on practice—” “Sadie,” Abigail says again, louder. “It’s like I’ve been poisoned,” I go on, my palms itching. “It’s like a sickness, and somehow, the cause and cure of it is him. I hate it so much, but I can’t even control my own brain—” “Sadie.” I freeze. Because this time, it’s not coming from Abigail. It’s a low, male voice, coming from behind me. My whole life seems to disintegrate before my eyes as I turn around on my heel, and I’m praying it’s not him, it can’t be him, please let it be anybody but Julius— “Sorry to interrupt,” he says. He’s holding out my cardigan in the doorway, and I can’t read any of the emotions on his face as he stares at me. “You left this behind at the campfire . . .” It’s somewhat difficult to hear him over the sound of my dignity splintering into a thousand pieces.

“Stop acting like you’re better than us,” Danny snaps. “You’re the type to write shady emails about people behind their backs.” “And you’re the type to write Sadie Wen is a bitch on a bike shed,” I shoot back. There’s a collective, sharp inhalation from the crowd. “Damn,” somebody mutters. I can’t even believe the words coming out of my own mouth, but it feels good. I’m so tired of playing nice, of smiling as people walk over me. What I’m realizing is that if you’re quiet about the things that hurt you, people are only going to mistake your tolerance for permission. And they’re going to hurt you again and again. “Yeah, I know it was you,” I say coldly, folding my arms across my chest. Danny stares at me. “You know? So you were the one who sent Julius to punch me?” The whole room screeches to a stop. The world freezes on its axis. Now it’s my turn to stare. “Julius punched you?” “Julius punched him?” someone else whispers in the background. “But I thought he and Sadie hated each other.” “But they kissed each other,” someone says. “At that party, remember?” “Wait, Julius and Sadie kissed each other?” someone asks. “Why am I so behind on the gossip? How did I miss this?” “Yeah, well, seeing as she sent him a bunch of emails—” “Technically, Abigail sent it.” “Abigail sent it? Sadie’s best friend, Abigail?” “Sorry, I was walking past their dorm room and kind of overheard a bit of their conversation—I left just as Julius showed up to her room though. So I’m guessing he likes her...

Everything floods through my brain at once. The look on his face when he stood in my doorway. The idea that he’d punched Danny for me. The fact that he heard me state very clearly that I like him so much it feels like a sickness— Shut up, I tell my brain.

“I wanted to talk to you,” he says. My pulse skips. Hope. Foolish, irrational hope takes root inside me. But I wipe my voice clean of it, because there are countless directions this conversation could go. He could be here to talk to me about the math test next week. About weather patterns. About how pretty Rosie is. About how they’ve run out of buckets. If it’s not what I so desperately want it to be, at least I can save myself the embarrassment of anticipating anything. “Why?” He huffs out a laugh. “You’re too smart to act this slow. You know why. We both do.” “What, are you going to accuse me of pitying you? Of being too nice?” I ask. It’s a challenge. This is what we do, I realize. We talk in circles. We give each other riddles, confounding clues, half answers. Everything and anything but the truth. “No— No, I’m sorry for that,” he says quickly. Swallows. He’s never sounded so nervous, so unsure of himself, and I find my anger bleeding out of me. “I didn’t mean to say those things. I shouldn’t have assumed . . . There were only two possible explanations for why you were acting the way you were, and the other seemed too unlikely. And I was—scared.” “Scared?” The last of my frustration vanishes like smoke in a breeze. It’s almost funny; nobody else infuriates me like he does, but nobody else makes it this difficult to stay mad. “Of what?” “Losing,” he whispers.

“You have to understand . . . If you knew the effect you had on me, how often I think about you, the things I would do for you . . . I wouldn’t stand a chance against you ever again. You would have taken everything from me,” he goes on in a rush, like the words are burning him from within, like he has to get it out before the pain becomes overwhelming. “Not just a debating championship or some points for a test or a fancy award or a spot in a competition—but my whole heart. My pride. God, my sanity. It would be all over. You would annihilate me.”

“I mean, nothing has even really happened between us,” he says hoarsely, “and already it’s hard for me to concentrate whenever you’re around. My brother was right, in a sense, about you being a distraction, except you’re so much more than that. I can’t pretend to care about the things that once interested me. I can’t fall asleep. I play through every look you’ve ever cast in my direction. I read through your emails over and over until they’re carved into my memory. You did this to me,” he says, and there’s a rough, bitter edge to his voice now, nearly an accusation.

“You had to write those awful emails,” he continues, lowering himself down next to me. Except he’s kneeling, and he’s still too close. I’m convinced he can hear my heart thrumming. “You had to kiss me, then kick me, then fill my head with your voice. You made it clear—so terribly clear—how much you hate me. That I’m the last person in the world you would ever consider. But I kept looking for signs that would suggest otherwise. I kept wondering if it was still possible. Because I’m willing to lose everything,” he says, his eyes blacker than the surrounding darkness, than the sky outside, “so long as I don’t lose you.”

“Of course, if you . . . if you don’t want to,” he says into the silence, sliding his gaze away from me, “I can accept that. I won’t bring it up again. I know I’m not . . . I know what I’m like. That I’m infuriating. And selfish. And cruel. I know I’m not perfect the way my brother is, and I manage to disappoint my parents every time. It’s okay if you don’t choose me, really—I never expected to be the first choice. I wouldn’t blame you—” “I do choose you.” He doesn’t seem to hear me at first. He’s still talking, rambling really, the words flowing out like rainwater. “I can’t always say pretty things, and sometimes I tease you when really I just want you to look my way, and— Wait.” He stops. Even his breath freezes in his throat. “What . . . did you just say? Say it again.” “I choose you,” I say quietly, glad for the shadows concealing my flushed cheeks. For the support of the wall behind me. “You’ll always be my first choice, Julius Gong.” “Really?” “Really.”

I twist my head away. “I recall you saying you would rather die than kiss me again.” He lets out a soft, half-stifled groan, and the sound shoots straight through my bloodstream. Makes my pulse quicken. “God, you really know how to hold a grudge.” “They’re your words, not mine,” I tell him, refusing to sway. “You’re killing me now,” he murmurs against my neck. His lips graze my skin, and his other hand slides up, tangles in my hair, his nails lightly scraping my scalp. Despite myself, I feel my resolve buckle. “Isn’t that enough?”

“Fine, then.” His breath warms the shell of my ear. Tickles my cheek. “Please.” I can feel my heart pounding. “What?” “Please, Sadie. I’m begging.” A triumphant grin splits over my face. “All right. I suppose, in that case—” He doesn’t even give me a chance to finish my sentence. His mouth is on mine in an instant, desperate, urgent. And I cave in. I hate surrendering, but maybe it’s different when you’re both surrendering to the same thing, because this doesn’t feel awful. The opposite, actually.

“N‑nothing. I just—” It’s hard to focus. I squeeze my eyes shut. “It just doesn’t feel real.” He shifts back, and the sudden absence almost feels like physical pain—until he kisses the curve of my neck. Murmurs, “I know. Even when I was imagining it—” “You imagined this?” He pauses, which feels like unfair punishment. Then he brings his lips firmly up to mine again. “Do you always pay such close attention to everything people say?” he demands between short, uneven breaths. “No. Only what you say.”

He has a point. A very good one. And in either case, I don’t have the strength to argue any further, because he’s kissing me again, and it’s everything. It’s so satisfyingly perfect. It’s as if I’ve been suffocating in silence for days, months, years, and now I can finally inhale. Nothing has ever made as much sense as his hands on my waist, his heart hammering against my rib cage, the involuntary sound he makes when I adjust my posture, slide my hand farther down his neck to the hollow of his collarbones. He says my name, whispers it like it’s sacred. And just when I’m wondering how we could ever stop this, how I could ever do anything except listen to his sharp intakes of breath, let him kiss me until my head goes fuzzy— The lights come back on.

Then I find Julius watching me nervously. Like he’s waiting for me to tell him. To take it all back, now that the cover of darkness is gone and I can see him clearly for the first time. My heart throbs. I want him to know he looks more beautiful than ever in the light, up close. I want to kiss him again, until all his doubts dissipate to nothing. I want to take away everything that’s ever hurt him. But for now, I simply smile at him. Hold out my hand.

“Who else am I supposed to talk to when I’ve just kissed someone in the corridor during a rainstorm?”

Julius, I’m writing this to inform you that you’re the most infuriating person I’ve ever met. You, with your smug, razor-sharp smiles, your mocking eyes, your arrogance, and your vanity. Your voice when you call my name, your hands when they wrap around mine. I’m not so familiar with vices—I like to think I have none, but if anything were to count, you would be my only one. It must be an addiction or an obsession. I have never known anybody as completely as I know you, and yet I still want to sit next to you, draw close to you, closer. I want you to tell me every story, want to listen to you speak until the night sinks in the sky and the stars fade out. I want you to hold me like a grudge, keep me like a promise, haunt me like a ghost. You’re so beautiful it enrages me. Maybe you’re expecting an apology after all this time, so I’ll cut to the chase: It’s not coming. I apologize far too much—I’m working on it, I promise—but I’m not sorry for those emails. You know that evening when I stumbled across your conversation with your brother? All right, not stumbled—followed. That’s beside the point. Afterward, I could track the hurt in your eyes, and everything in me burned. I’m not sure if I expressed myself clearly enough then, if I’d convinced you enough. If not, then let me establish for now and forever that you will never be second. You will never be inadequate. You will never be anything but good. Because you care how your parents see you. Because you will talk about anythi...

You were right, Sadie Wen. I am completely, helplessly obsessed with you. Love, Julius