Fourteen was supposed to be an in-between year — too old for dolls, too young for love. But for Cara, it became the year everything changed.

When her brother’s best friend, Callum Adler, starts spending more time at their house, Cara notices things most adults ignore. The bruises. The quiet. The way their mother starts folding extra laundry like it’s second nature. Callum's broken home becomes a secret the whole family carries, and Cara — wide-eyed, overlooked, and quietly growing — starts to fall for him in all the ways she shouldn’t.

But Callum is four years older. Eighteen. Off-limits. Almost a man. And despite their quiet moments — the almosts, the shared glances, the night she asked to kiss him — he walks away without a goodbye, leaving her in the silence he helped create.

Years pass. Cara grows. Builds a life. Finds herself. By eighteen, she’s no longer just Kaden’s little sister. She’s her own person — confident, loved, maybe even happy. But everything tilts when she runs into Callum again at a skating rink. Older, composed, and entirely unexpected.

He’s not the same boy who used to sleep on her couch with bruises on his ribs — and she’s not the girl who watched him leave.

But unfinished things have a way of circling back.

Told in alternating perspectives of Cara and Callum, What We Never Said explores the slow burn of first love, the ache of timing, and what it really means to grow up — and grow apart — before finding your way back.

The morning light was already pressing against my blinds by the time I opened my eyes.


For a second, I didn't know why my heart was already racing.


It wasn't like it hadn't happened before — there were months when he was practically a third child in our family. But back then, he was just Callum. My brother's best friend. The guy who let me win at Mario Kart and stole our cereal like he paid the rent.


Now he was the guy who looked at me like I wasn't a kid anymore.


I sat up slowly, dragging the blankets off and letting my feet touch the hardwood floor. My skin was still warm from sleep, but everything else felt alert. Aware.


My phone was dead on the nightstand. I didn't care.


I moved to my closet, grabbing something without thinking too hard — a short black jersey dress, soft and worn in, hugging in all the right places. Something easy. Effortless. Comfortable but cute. I tugged it over my head and let it fall mid-thigh, then pulled on a pair of white Nike Dunks.


My hair was still damp at the ends from last night's shower, curling lightly around my shoulders. I didn't bother with makeup. I didn't need to pretend I hadn't just rolled out of bed.


I stood in front of the mirror for a second, adjusting the sleeves of the dress, wondering if he was awake. If he'd already left. If he was downstairs in the kitchen right now, eating toast like nothing had happened last night — like the distance between us hadn't bent and cracked and almost broken open.


My heart gave one solid, traitorous thump.


I pulled open my door and stepped into the hallway.


Chapter 18 - Cara