Counting Down with You(75)

My lips part but nothing comes out. He looked up anxiety? He bought me candles?

Ace doesn’t seem to mind my lack of response, focused on pulling out an envelope from the gift bag. “It’s a CD mixtape,” he says at my incredulous expression. “I wrote down the Spotify link, too, in case you wanted to listen on your phone. It’s songs that remind me of you. I just thought you should have it. Maybe it’ll help relax you, too.”

“Thank you,” I say, looking down at it, utterly mystified. No one has ever bought me candles before, much less made me a playlist.

He stares at me, expression wistful, before he looks away. “Okay. I’ll see you next week. Bye, Karina.”

“Bye,” I whisper, holding on to the gift bag with tight fingers as he walks away.

I close the door behind him and stare down at the bag, my breath caught in my throat.

Ace Clyde is an anomaly, and I have no idea what to do with him.

A Karina Ahmed Mixtape
“Light”—Sleeping At Last
“Bones”—Lewis Watson
“Almost (Sweet Music)”—Hozier
“Call Me Out”—Sarah Close
“Come Into The Water”—Mitski
“Hypnotised”—Years and Years
“Fuck Em Only We Know”—Banks
“Trust”—Alina Baraz
“Get You The Moon (feat. Sn?w)”—Kina
“Your Hand In Mine”—Explosions In The Sky
**Bonus: because I know how much you love pop music.
“Adore You”—Harry Styles
“Levitating”—Dua Lipa
“Treacherous”—Taylor Swift
“Euphoria”—BTS
“We Made It”—Louis Tomlinson
“Oh my God,” Cora says in disbelief, looking at the handwritten letter Ace put inside the CD case, with each song title accompanied by underlined lyrics. “Karina, oh my God, he’s literally in love with you.”

“He’s not in love with me,” I say, but my voice is weak. “It’s been like half a month.”

“So?” Cora says, waving the letter in my face before gesturing to the expensive candles laid out in front of us. “Do you see this shit? Do you need glasses?”

Nandini finishes pulling the Spotify playlist up on my smart TV and we all silently stare at the title. Lionheart.

“What does that mean?” Nandini asks, poking me sharply.

I gape, unsure how to provide a proper definition right now. Ace made me a playlist titled Lionheart filled with love songs?

Cora starts typing rapidly into her phone before she looks at Nandini with wide eyes. “A person of exceptional courage and bravery.”

“Karina.”

“I don’t know what to tell you!”

“Maybe tell me why this dumbass made you a mixtape.”

“I don’t have the answer!”

We all stare at each other, at an impasse.

Cora looks away from me to grab the remote. “Let me hear this. I can’t even grasp what’s happening right now.”

Listening to the playlist makes everything so much worse. The thought of Ace listening to songs this gentle and writing down lyrics in correlation to me...

“I think I’m dying,” I say, knees weakening as I collapse against the couch. “This is the way the world ends. Not with a bang, but with a whimper.”

“This is not the time to quote some dead old white man,” Cora grumbles.

“There’s never a time for quoting dead old white men,” Nandini adds, but her gaze is more tempered. “Karina, you heard those songs. You must’ve had some sort of realization.”

I throw myself face-first into the cushions and groan. I can’t handle the thought of Ace liking me back, not when I know nothing can come of it.

“Karina,” Cora whines, poking my rib cage. “This is Ace Clyde. He probably hates dogs, but he still likes you.”

“He does not hate dogs.” I look at her, disbelief momentarily staying my misery. “His dog is named Spade, and he’s very sweet.”

“I thought you were afraid of dogs,” Nandini says with a raised eyebrow. “How did you come to learn Spade is ‘very sweet’?”

“That is not the point!” I say, turning back toward the cushion. A barrage of memories burst like painful fireworks in my chest. The bakery, the bookstore, his honesty, my vulnerability, our secrets...

“I think that’s exactly the point, Karina.” Nandini joins Cora in her incessant poking. “You’re different with him. Bolder. Braver. Stronger.”

“You’re just saying random words right now,” I say. But I know they’re not wrong. The fire inside me that Ace loves to write soliloquies about is burning brighter than ever.

“You look so much happier,” Nandini says, reaching for my shoulder and forcibly turning me around. “You like him, don’t you?”

“I can’t.”

“But you do,” Cora says. “Admit it, Karina. You have a crush on Alistair Clyde. Maybe even more than that.”

I press my lips together, refusing to say anything. I haven’t said it out loud. Even with Samir, I denied it to the very end until everything blew up in my face.

If I say it to someone else, this becomes too real. The weight of my parents’ disappointment becomes soul crushing.