I Love You More Than I'm Afraid (Our Forevers #2) by Rebel Hart (the first e reader .txt) 📕

back to my room. A pair of staff gave us wide smiles and wiggled their eyebrows at us as we passed. When the big fear is being gay, the thought that a 14-year-old and a 17-year-old might go into their bunk and fuck just never crossed their minds, or maybe it did, but it was conducive to their goal, so they allowed it to happen.

“Here we go,” Codie said as he guided me down onto my bed. “Just rest. They usually leave you for a few days after the chamber without asking questions. I’ll bring you meals, so don’t worry.”

He started to walk away, but I reached up and grabbed his arm. “Codie… How long was I down there?”

“Eighteen days,” Codie replied. “I was starting to get worried. I mean, I started out worried, but I was beginning to think you were only coming out of there on a stretcher. I’ve asked around, no one has held out for that long.”

“Eighteen days?” I responded breathlessly. “It felt…”

He nodded. “Longer and shorter?”

“Yeah.”

“Yeah. Time gets really warpy in there. It’s because you’re not doing anything else or seeing anything else. I heard they even bring you food at crazy times so that you don’t get any semblance of a schedule or consistency.”

“That’s monstrous.”

“Yeah, well, the world is monstrous to people like us.” He set a hand on my forehead. “Get some rest. I’ll be back around dinner. If you’re asleep, I’ll just leave your food next to your bed.”

“Thank you,” I whimpered.

Codie gave me one last smile then walked away, leaving me alone. It was weird, the feeling of not wanting to be alone and at the same time not wanting to be near any other living soul. It was knowing that the one person I wanted to see was miles away, likely with no idea where I was or why I wasn’t communicating with her. I closed my eyes and tried to think backwards, if I was in the isolation chamber for nearly three weeks, there was much less time left than I thought. It was close to the beginning of August, I imagined. Another month there sounded like torture, but much more doable than a month and a half or two months.

My eyes snapped open at the sound of a tapping nearby. When I first blinked, I could have sworn I was back down in the isolation chamber, but a better look around revealed I was still in my bunk in my room. The room itself was totally dark, and all the beds were filled with people. Looking to my left, I saw a tray of food sitting on top of the table—a sad burger and some limp fries.

Outside, I could hear rain pouring down, pounding against the window, and at first I thought that was what I heard and tried to close my eyes again. Then I heard the rhythmic tapping again. I stood up out of bed and traced the sound to the window behind my bedside table. Some of the strength had returned to my legs, so I walked up to it and opened it, filling the room with a rush of chilled air.

I looked out and saw nothing and assumed I was still exhausted, when I heard a quiet, “Hey.”

My head was getting drenched in rain, but it didn’t matter, because when I looked down, my eyes locked into a pair I knew well and had been all that was getting me through the past two months.

“H-Hannah?” I whined.

I’d been through a lot, so much that I even hallucinated down in the isolation chamber, so when I saw the beautiful blonde standing beneath the window, looking straight up at me with a smile, equally drenched in rain, I assumed I was just dreaming. I reached hand forward, and because of the foundation the camp was up on, my window was still several feet off the ground. I was able to reach down about half the distance, and Hannah reached up, craning on her tiptoes, until her fingertips brushed mine.

“Hey,” she whispered.

Tears filled my eyes and I was so happy I thought I was going to be sick. “Hi.”

Hannah was my very best friend. We’d been friends since we were born, because our mothers had been best friends, as had their mothers. The only difference, though a significant one, was that I’d made short work of falling in love with Hannah. It was pretty clear she felt the same way, though we’d never put words to it. It never felt like we had to. Whatever the case, I was so happy to see her.

“Why are you here?” I asked.

“Can we talk about that later?” she whispered back. “Come on. Let’s get out of here.”

I shook my head. “We’re out in the middle of nowhere. How will we get out of here?”

“The same way I got here, hitchhiking.” She reached up even further to grab my hand. “Come on. Let’s go.”

“Okay. Wait just a second. I’ll be right back.”

Her eyes widened. “What? No. We have to go.”

“I can’t leave Codie,” I said.

Hannah’s expression darkened a bit. “Who?”

It filled me with hope and I actually cried a little. “A very gay guy friend I made here.”

She let out a sigh of relief. “Oh.”

“I’ll be back.”

“Hurry,” she huffed.

Turning around, I noticed that several of my roommates were staring at me. The girls all slept in one room of several bunks while all of the boys slept in another—as little sense as that made given the nature of the reason we’d all been gathered there. I became instantly afraid that someone was going to tell on me, but then one of the girls climbed out of her bed.

“You’re going to get Codie?” she asked quietly.

I nodded. “Yeah.”

She smiled. “I’ll watch the halls for you.”

I should have known. Every single person in there understood the struggle. Of course they wouldn’t tell on me. They were glad someone was getting out. “Thank you.”

She led the way out of the room, glancing in both