“Sedona, calm down?—”
“Don’t tell me to calm down! We’ve been dating for a whole year. A year, Cole. And you can’t be there for me for one day? Not even one?”
He rubs his face. “I just landed the biggest case of my career. The partners are watching everything I do right now. I can’t just bail on them.”
“You’re bailing on me.”
“That’s not fair.”
My chest tightens like something inside is collapsing. “He’s my father. He… he wasn’t perfect. He drank too much. He shut everyone out. He never forgave me for leaving. But he was still my father, and this is all I have left to do for him. And I wanted you with me.”
Cole stands, frustration sharpening his features. “You and your father weren’t even close. Why is this suddenly so important?”
The words land like a slap.
“That doesn’t matter. He’s dead, Cole. And you’re my boyfriend. You’re supposed to be the person who shows up for me during one of the hardest periods of my life.” How the hell does he not get that?
He moves around the room, grabbing his briefcase, straightening his tie like he’s protecting himself behind layers of professionalism. “I’m sorry, but I can’t lose this case. I have to be smart about my future.”
“My father just lost his entire future!” I shout. “And you can’t spare one day?”
He lifts his hands. “I said I’m sorry. But nothing I do will change anything for him now.”
The room feels unfamiliar. Cold. Small. Wrong.
“Get out,” I say.
“Sedona—”
“Please get out before I say something I’ll regret.”
He stares at me for a second, maybe weighing whether to argue, but then he turns and walks out. The door shuts behind him with a dull thud, and the quiet after is louder than anything he said.
My legs give out, and I fold onto the edge of the sofa. Tears flood before I can stop them. I try to breathe, but everythinginside me hurts—anger, heartbreak, grief twisting together until I can’t tell one from the other.
That’s how Clara finds me an hour later—crumpled on the floor, surrounded by half-packed clothes, mascara smudged under my eyes.
“Damn, baby,” she says, dropping her bag and falling to her knees beside me. “What happened?”
I choke through the whole story.
The fight. The perfume. The excuses. The way he turned the whole thing into something trivial, like my grief didn’t matter. LikeIdidn’t matter.
Clara listens, her hand rubbing circles on my back. When I finish, she breaks out in a violent snort.
“Fuck that guy,” she says. “Seriously. Fuck. Him.”
A sad laugh sputters out of me. Clara helps me up, wipes my cheeks, and stands.
“Okay,” she says, rolling her shoulders like she’s gearing up for battle. “We’re finishing this packing so we don’t miss the flight. We meet with the funeral director at eleven tomorrow, and I am not letting you face that alone.”
She took PTO for this. She rearranged her entire week for me. Cole couldn’t even rearrange his afternoon.
I swallow hard. Clara and I lost touch for a really long time, but I found her again right when I needed her the most.
She folds the clothes I balled up earlier, finds my charger, and tucks my toiletries into the front pocket of my bag. I follow her, doing the motions she assigns me because I can’t trust my brain to think straight on its own.
“Sweetheart,” she says gently, “your dad loved you.”
