“I’m observing,” I’d told him, leaning against the counter, pretending I wasn’t just watching the way the shirt slid off one shoulder.
“Observing is what you do with your residents,” he’d said. “This is cooking. It requires joy.”
I smiled at that. God, that smile. “I thought it required instructions.”
He’d turned, holding a wooden spoon like a weapon. “You think everything comes with a manual.”
“Doesn’t it?”
“No, Adrian.” His voice had gone low, playful, a spark catching. “Sometimes you just feel your way through it.”
The rest came back in pieces—the flick of sauce against the stove. The moment he reached past me for the salt. The smell of basil and heat and something electric in the space between us.
I caught his wrist. “You’re making a mess.”
“Maybe that’s the point,” he’d said, eyes glinting.
Then it all blurred: the press of him against me, the gasp that escaped when our mouths met, the taste of tomato and wine and laughter. He’d pushed me back against the sink, breathless, grinning.
“Dinner’s going to burn,” he murmured against my mouth.
“Let it.” My lips brushed his. “We don’t need a manual for this next part. We’re gonna feel our way through it.”
His laugh vibrated against me, incredulous and full of life. God, I’d give anything to hear that sound again.
For one dizzy heartbeat, I could feel his warmth, his pulse,the impossible closeness of being seen and wanted in the same breath. Then it was gone. The kitchen was still again. The only heat left was the sting of tears on my face.
I looked around at the wreckage of our life: the shards, the loneliness, the space where love used to live. The air was thick with grief and citrus cleaner and the faint trace of something floral clinging to the counter.
My chest constricted. I couldn’t stay there, sitting in the mess I’d made. The floor pressed into my tailbone, the room spinning just enough to make me dizzy. I braced my hands on the tile and pushed myself upright, every movement scraping against exhaustion.
The house was too quiet. Every creak was an accusation that I hadn’t brought Eli home with me. The stairs loomed ahead, shadowed and endless, and I climbed them like a man walking toward judgment. My hand slid along the railing, slick with sweat, trembling as I reached the landing.
Our bedroom door was open. I paused in the doorway, heart catching. Everything was untouched—his book on the nightstand, half a glass of water by the bed, the dent in his pillow. The comforter still showed rumples from that morning, or perhaps the morning before; I couldn’t tell anymore. Time had fractured.
I crossed the room and sank onto the edge of the bed. My fingers found the edge of his pillow, dragging it into my lap. It still smelled faintly of him, linen and soap, a scent that meant home.
I pressed it to my face and felt something inside me collapse.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered into the cotton. The words came out broken, wet, half-formed. “I should’ve listened. I should’ve been here.”
I wanted to crawl beneath the covers and disappear. Instead, I stripped out of the blood-stiffened scrubs, the fabric tearing as I pulled them free, and let them fall in a heap on the floor. The shower ran before I even realized I’d turned it on.
The scalding water stung like penance—hot and hard, burning away everything but regret. The red on my skin bled down the drain, swirling pink, then clear. But the regret stayed.
By the time I shut off the tap, the mirror had fogged over. My reflection was only a blur, unrecognizable. Maybe that was fitting.
I grabbed a towel, sat on the edge of the tub, and let the silence swallow me again.
Two more hours, I told myself. Two more hours and I’d go back to the hospital. But right now, I just needed to survive the space where he wasn’t.
I stripped off the damp towel and let it fall, skin still warm and pink from the shower. In the bedroom, I meant to get dressed, but bypassed the dresser in a haze, moving toward the bed like muscle memory was steering me there, not choice.
I hit the mattress before I realized I’d moved that far. His scent and his memory surrounded me, but I’d never felt further away from him. The realization was a blow to the chest.
I reached for his pillow again. It was instinct, the same way I used to reach for his hand in the dark. My throat locked.
“I’m trying,” I rasped into the pillow. “I swear I’m trying.”
