“You didn’t need a house, did you?” The words came softer than a confession. “You just neededme.”
Pain bubbled up inside my chest and leaked from my eyes. How could I have mistreated such a beautiful heart?
“I should’ve known,” I said. “I should’ve—God, Eli, I should’veheardyou.”
My legs gave out before I realized I was falling. I caught the edge of the bed, sliding down until I was on the floor, forehead pressed to the back of his hand. The linoleum was cold against my legs.
“I wasted so much time,” I said, voice breaking apart. “So much time being angry, being right, being gone.” Tears spilled, hot and relentless. “I thought I was saving us. But I was just—” letting out a ragged breath. “I was justlosingyou slower.”
The sound that came out of me didn’t feel human, somewhere between a sob and a curse. I stayed like that, gripping his hand, whispering every apology I should’ve said when it mattered.
For the house. For the isolation. For the nights I let my pride fill the space where love should’ve been.
For the first time since he’d fallen silent, I started talking—really talking. About the time I saw him practicing for his interview in the bathroom mirror with shaving cream on his face, the way he hummed off-key when he cooked, the stupid inside jokes we hadn’t said in years. How I was mildly obsessed with watching him after he showered, standing naked in front of the foggy bathroom mirror, studying his reflection, primping his hair.
The words poured out of me in uneven waves. Small, desperate offerings of remorse.
“Just come back,” I whispered. “You can yell at me, you canleave me, you can hate me—just come back and let me say it to your face.”
A moment passed. Then another. Nothing changed.
Still, I stayed there. Because that’s what he would’ve done. Because this time I wasn’t walking away.
I stayed there until I lost track of time. The world outside that room could’ve burned, and I wouldn’t have noticed. All that mattered was the rise and fall of his chest, the proof that he was still here. That I still had something to lose.
My fingers were stiff from holding his; my throat raw from too many words that came too late. My scalp itched, and I reeked of BO and bad breath, but still I stayed.
I pressed my lips to the back of his hand. “I’m sorry,” I whispered, voice cracking. “For all of it. For not being better. For making you carry us when I should’ve been right there beside you.”
The tears came slower now, heavier, because they’d finally reached the bottom of me. I didn’t even try to stop them. I just let them fall, let myself finally break where he could see me.
That’s how his parents found me.
Collapsed and broken on the floor, clutching their son’s hand as if it were the only thing keeping me alive.
Chapter 14
Sharing The Grief
ADRIAN
Sunburned from their cruise, they still wore the brightness of vacation on their faces—Eli’s mom in a floral sundress, his dad in a wrinkled Polo, both pulling luggage behind them because they’d come straight from the airport without stopping to change.
The sound of the suitcase wheels on the tile cut through the hush of the ICU. A foreign noise in a place that only knew whispers and machines. I glanced up, and for one impossible second, they looked like travelers lost in the wrong country—suitcases, sunglasses perched on heads, wide-eyed confusion giving way to horror as they took in the sight before them.
Me, on the floor, wearing bloodied scrubs.
Eli, motionless in the bed.
The equipment keeping score of his pulse, his breath, his borrowed time.
His mother’s hand flew to her mouth. The other droppedthe handle of her suitcase. His father didn’t move at first. He just stood there, shoulders squared, trying to hold the world still through willpower alone. Then he crossed the space between us in two strides, and for a moment, I thought he might hit me.
He just stopped in front of me, eyes glassy, chest heaving as if he’d run the entire way from the airport. His hand came down on my shoulder—needing something solid to hold on to. His voice broke before the words did.
“Adrian,” he said quietly. “Oh, God… I’m so sorry you were alone.”
My throat wouldn’t open all the way to speak.
