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Chapter 10

“Stop. It’s something my gran used to say. I try to not swear around the students. Habit. Where’s my book-bag? Do I have decent clothes here?”

“Not clean ones. Wait, here, towel.” He wasn’t sure how much he’d helped, though Jeremiah seemed to be well enough, or at least distracted by the need to find a left shoe before running off to open the schoolhouse. “Your hair is sort of…”

Jeremiah made a desperate sort of noise, ran a hand through it, left strands in further fluffy disarray.

“No,” Cade said, discovering suddenly that he wanted to laugh, discovering that he could want to laugh, “that’s not better. It’s adorable. Leave it.”

Jeremiah sighed. They ran down creaking old friendly stairs hand in hand. The creaks echoed in the same spots; wooden knots and whorls remembered them as boys. Cade was not in the mood to be annoyed by this, with Jeremiah’s hand in his, with the shiver of that peak and that laughter lingering along his spine, on his lips.