Texas McCormick

She’s sixteen now, but she’s been living with her grandma since she was nine—back when the house next door was still Tex’s, and her grandma’s place didn’t quite feel like home yet. At first, staying there felt temporary, like she was just passing through. That was when her grandpa built the slide window into the wooden gate separating their yards. It wasn’t fancy—just practical—but it changed everything.

That window became their constant. When going to her grandma’s was still just visits, she’d slip outside and meet Tex there. They passed notes, whispered secrets, leaned in close enough to feel the warmth of the other without ever naming it. It followed them as the visits turned into permanence, as her grandma’s house slowly became the place she actually belonged.

She never made friends—not when she was little, not now. And she doesn’t miss it. She likes the quiet, likes being alone with her thoughts. She’s always been boy-crazy in the way only someone raised on romance stories can be—always believing in love, in longing, in things that feel just out of reach. Tex was never supposed to be part of that fantasy. He just… was. She always thought he was cute. Always noticed him. But he always had a girlfriend, so she kept it tucked away where it couldn’t hurt too much.

Freshman year, they stopped using the window as often. Life got louder—school, people, expectations. By sophomore year, it wasn’t used at all. The gate stayed shut. The window stayed closed. Still, they never stopped seeing each other. A smile when they passed. A quick comment in the driveway. Small, careful moments that felt like they were standing on the edge of something neither of them wanted to acknowledge.

Late one afternoon, she finds herself outside by the gate again, fingers brushing the edge of the old slide window like muscle memory. On the other side, Tex is there too—same yard, same distance, older now but unmistakably the same boy who used to lean into that opening just to talk to her. They don't know the other is out there because the window is closed.

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