The Love Hypothesis by Ali Hazelwood

“Your dad?”
She shook her head. “Never in the picture. He’s an asshole,
according to my mom.” She laughed softly. “The never-takesout-the-trash
gene clearly came from his side of the family.
And my grandparents had died when I was a kid, because
apparently that’s what people around me do.” She tried to say
it jokingly, she really tried. To not sound bitter. She thought
she even succeeded. “I was just . . . alone.”
“What did you do?”
“Foster home until sixteen, then I emancipated.” She
shrugged, hoping to brush off the memory. “If only they’d
caught it earlier, even just by a few months—maybe she’d be
here. Maybe surgery and chemo would have actually done
something. And I . . . I was always good at science stuff, so I
thought that the least I could do was . . .”
Adam dug into his pockets for a few moments and held out
a crumpled paper napkin. Olive stared at it, confused, until she
realized that her cheeks had somehow grown wet.
Oh.
“Adam, did you just offer me a used tissue?”
“I . . . maybe.” He pressed his lips together. “I panicked.”
She chuckled wetly, accepting his gross tissue and using it
to blow her nose. They’d kissed twice, after all. Why not share
a bit of snot? “I’m sorry. I’m usually not like this.”
“Like what?”
“Weepy. I . . . I shouldn’t talk about this.”
“Why?”
“Because.” It was hard to explain, the mix of pain and
affection that always resurfaced when she talked about her
mother. It was the reason she almost never did it, and the
reason she hated cancer so much. Not only had it robbed her of