Elijah's POV:

I got back in my car just a few minutes after Rowan and her mom had left the cemetery. I hadn't been planning to leave as early as I did, but something about their hasty departure had brought my attention to how late it was getting.

It had been time for me to go, anyway.

My fingers tightened around the steering wheel as I drove, my mind unable to push the encounter out of my head. Seeing Rowan there...at the cemetery...had been disheartening. The glimmer of tears hadn't been in her eyes as it had during our first encounter, but what replaced it was almost worse.

When we had first met, she'd had an air of innocence that had drawn me in. Yet there had been a heaviness in her eyes. It was the look of someone who had dueled with life. Someone who was still trying to find happiness despite knowing grief. It was a look that I was all too familiar with.

Now I knew what it was I'd seen when she had been panicking when she nearly hit me.

Pain.

I wanted to know why I had seen the emotion on her face twice now.

The entire ride home, my mind didn't stray from her, flitting in between the two encounters we'd had so far. Cole was sitting on the couch when I made it inside my apartment. It wasn't surprising to see him engrossed in a game. He had to be the biggest soccer-playing football fan I knew.

He glanced at me after a second, assessing me silently before speaking.

"You okay?"

"I'm good," I answered, taking a seat on the edge of the couch, and turning my attention to the game.

He had known what I had gone to do and had offered to drive. But going to visit my brother was something that I liked to do alone.

"Are you sure? We can talk if you need to." He began to raise the remote to the tv, but I shook my head and he paused. I really was okay. "Are we still going to Hayden's house next week after the game?" He asked after a few minutes of silence.

I raised an eyebrow.

"You don't want to go anymore?"

"Just checking," he said. "Wanted to make sure that you didn't have any plans." I tilted my head up in acknowledgment of what he had said.

"Do you know anything about Rowan Larkin?"

I tried to look nonchalant as if the question hadn't been eating at me for a while. She had been wearing a soccer t-shirt when I had seen her on campus earlier. It had been one of the things that had caused me to falter. I hadn't even considered the idea that she was taken. I couldn't remember the number that had been on it, but I found that I didn't want to.

"You do know that considering that there are more than a thousand people at this University. I shouldn't know who the heck you are talking about."

Smart-aleck.

"Cole, yes or no."

He laughed.

"I think she is friends with Hayden and that blond chic, Skylar. I have seen her at a few games and hangouts, but we never really talked."

I stilled.

"She and him...are they an item?"

"Why?" he asked, a wide grin on his face. "Has a girl finally convinced the famous Elijah Scott to settle down? And if so, why am I only hearing about her now?"

I knew I shouldn't have asked him.

"Was just curious. She almost hit me with her car yesterday." Cole glanced at me, his eyebrows flying upward in surprise, and I shrugged. "Everything was fine. There was no impact. It almost seemed like we had hit it off, but then she acted like she didn't know who I was today." I paused. "I also saw her at the cemetery."

There was a pause.

"That's kinky."

"Shut up."

He winked but became serious again. "I don't know, man. Women are weird sometimes. Maybe she was just embarrassed about having almost hit you, and wasn't expecting you to talk to her."

I said nothing, unable to scratch the feeling that there had been something more going on with Rowan.

Cole paused before adding, "And no. I am pretty sure Hayden is into Skylar. She wears his jersey."

Couldn't say I was disappointed to hear that.

I wished that I didn't care about what he said as much as I did. After all, Rowan and I had just met. It was already strange enough that she had been on my mind so much. I got up after a second, making my way to the kitchen. I heated some leftover pizza, that despite having been there for a few days, didn't smell or look questionable.

I ate it quickly before heading to my room, unable to completely drop the odd happenstance of earlier. I called out to Cole, letting him know that I was calling it a night, as I walked past the living room and he just nodded, too engrossed in the game to look up.

Even after I laid down, my thoughts remained consumed by Rowan, despite my attempts to sleep. She was certainly something else. A bag of mystery in more ways than one. I usually wasn't this interested in a girl, after only a few days of knowing them, but The grey-eyed beauty had stolen my attention. I don't even think she realized that she had.

An hour passed by, and I was still awake.

I always had trouble sleeping though. It was sort of comical in a way.

There I was, with twenty-one years behind me, yet I was still afraid of the monsters under my bed. In my defense, these ones were much worse than the ones that had sent me running to Carter's room when I was younger.

These were way crueler.

They plagued my nights mercilessly, always leaving me drowning in guilt the next morning. They left me desperate for the torturous memories to pass from me, and for my mind to be left desolate. To be free. While my heart ached to forget that night nine years ago.

But both desires were mere prayers unanswered.

So I found my remedy through not sleeping most nights.

A helpful, panacea. Although, others would say that it did more harm than good. I didn't care though.

Because the silent torment that loomed each night, taunting me as I thought about everything I could have done to prevent the past, was getting to be too much to bear.

Over the years I'd learned to appreciate the faux sense of peace my lack of sleep brought forth.

Even if fake, I preferred it to the nightmares that left me covered in sweat and with a pressure on my chest that was seldom merciful.