I stood there, frozen between instinct and desire, acutely aware of my current state—dirt smudged on my cheek, hair escaping its messy braid, old jeans with holes in both knees. This wasn't how you were supposed to look when a man showed up at your door. This wasn't?—
But Levi was already walking toward me, and his eyes weren't judging. They were warm. Appreciative, even, as they swept over my disheveled appearance.
"You've been working," he observed, stopping at a respectful distance. "The garden looks incredible, by the way. Even better up close than from the road."
"It's... thank you." I pulled off my gloves, tucking them into my back pocket, suddenly self-conscious about the dirt under my nails. "I wasn't expecting company."
"I know. I probably should have called first." He held up the paper bag, and the aroma that wafted from it made my stomach clench with sudden hunger. Warm bread, yeasty and perfect, with an undertone of something sweet—cinnamon, maybe, or brown sugar. "But I was up early baking, and I kept thinkingabout you out here alone, and I figured... what's the worst that could happen? You tell me to leave, I eat all this bread myself, everybody wins."
A laugh escaped me—unexpected, rusty from disuse. "That doesn't sound like everybody winning."
"It does if you've tasted my bread." His grin was infectious, and I felt my shoulders relaxing despite myself. "Sourdough. Fresh from the oven about an hour ago. Still warm if you want to find out what you'd be missing."
I should say no. I should thank him politely, take the bread, send him on his way. That's what the old Daphne would do—the Daphne who had survived five years alone by keeping everyone at arm's length, who had convinced herself that solitude was the same as safety.
But that Daphne hadn't sat at a table surrounded by warmth and laughter and the intoxicating feeling of belonging. That Daphne hadn't felt the crack in her walls or seen the light seeping through.
"Would you like some coffee?" The words came out before I could stop them, and I watched Levi's expression shift from hopeful to genuinely happy—a transformation that did something complicated to my heartbeat.
"I would love some coffee." His voice was as warm as his smile.
We walked to the cabin together, close enough that I could feel the warmth radiating from his skin, smell the flour and yeast that clung to his clothes beneath something cleaner. He didn't try to fill the silence with chatter, didn't push for conversation or explanation. He just walked beside me, present and patient, like he had all the time in the world.
The cabin looked different through his eyes—I could tell by the way he paused at the threshold, taking it all in with obvious interest. The worn wooden counters I'd sanded and sealedmyself. The herbs hung in fragrant bundles near the window—lavender, rosemary, and thyme. The collection of mismatched mugs on open shelves, each one with its own story. The sunlight falling in golden rectangles across the scrubbed pine floor.
"This is beautiful," he said, and the sincerity in his voice made my chest tight. "It feels..warm."
"I've had five years to make it mine." I moved toward the coffee maker, grateful for something to do with my hands. "When I first moved in, it was practically falling apart. Leaky roof, rotted porch boards, mice in the walls. Everyone said I was crazy for taking it on."
"But you did anyway." He laughed softly.
"I needed something to fix." The admission slipped out more honestly than I'd intended. "Something I could control. Something that would stay fixed once I'd done the work."
Levi was quiet for a moment, and when I glanced over my shoulder, I found him watching me with an expression I couldn't quite read. Not pity—thank God, no pity—but something deeper. Understanding, maybe? Recognition.
"I get that," he said softly. "After Marcus—my brother—after going through everything with him and then losing him… I needed something like that too. Something I could shape with my own hands, something that would rise and transform and become exactly what I intended it to be." He set the bread on the counter, his fingers lingering on the paper bag. "That's when I started baking. Bread doesn't lie to you. You put in the work, you follow the process, you trust the chemistry, and it rewards you. Every single time."
The coffee maker gurgled to life, filling the kitchen with its familiar bitter scent, and I let the sound cover the silence while I processed his words. He'd shared something real—something vulnerable—and the old Daphne would have deflected, changedthe subject, rebuilt the wall he'd just walked through. But I was tired of walls and so tired of being alone within them.
"Will you tell me about him?" I asked quietly. "About Marcus?"
Levi's eyebrows rose slightly, surprise flickering across his features. But he nodded, settling against my counter like he belonged there, his body relaxed even as his eyes grew serious.
"He's was my older brother. Two years ahead of me, which meant he was always supposed to be the successful one. The smart one. The one my parents held up as an example." He laughed, but there was old pain in it. "And he was, for a while. Straight A's, full scholarship, the wholeGolden Boypackage. But underneath all that pressure, something was breaking. He just got really good at hiding it."
I pulled two mugs from the cabinet—my chipped one and the one with faded sunflowers—and poured the coffee while he talked. The ritual gave me something to focus on, somewhere to look that wasn't his face, where the memories were playing out like shadows.
"It started with pills. Prescription stuff at first, then whatever he could get. He was self-medicating for anxiety, for depression, for the crushing weight of everyone's expectations. By the time I figured out what was happening, he was already drowning." Levi accepted the mug I offered, wrapping both hands around it like the warmth was something he needed. "His girlfriend at the time—if you can call her that—made everything worse. She was obsessive, controlling. When he tried to break it off, she..." He shook his head. "Let's just say Trinity's dead plant is amateur hour compared to what she put him through."
My stomach clenched at the mention of Trinity, but beneath that, a deeper ache bloomed—for Levi, for Marcus, for the shared understanding of watching someone you love be systematically destroyed.
"He is gone now?" I asked softly.
"Yes…the drugs finally took him." The words carried weight, hope tempered by experience. "I just hope he is at peace now after everything.”
We stood there for a moment, the silence full but not uncomfortable, two people who had just shown each other something real. Then Levi set down his mug and reached for the paper bag.
"Enough heavy stuff. You need to try this bread while it's still got some warmth to it." He pulled out the loaf, and my breath caught at the sight of it. Golden-brown crust that crackled slightly as he handled it, the interior visible where he'd torn off a corner to test it—soft and open-crumbed, with the distinctive tang of proper sourdough. It was beautiful.
