The last of the visitors leaves with tight hugs and promises they know won’t be kept. Diane steps out to make a phone call, brushing her fingers over Frank’s shoulder on the way out, like she’s committing the shape of him to memory.
The door clicks shut.
Frank exhales, the performance slipping.
“You don’t have to hover,” he says lightly. “I’m not going anywhere in the next ten minutes.”
I smile faintly and pull the chair closer anyway. “Humor me.”
He watches me for a moment, then nods. “You’re good at this.”
“At what?”
“Staying,” he says. “Most people get scared when it gets this quiet.”
I swallow. “I know what quiet like this means.”
He studies me, eyes sharp despite everything. “Yeah, you do.”
We sit for a moment without speaking. The machines hum softly around us, steady and indifferent.
“He didn’t used to run,” Frank says suddenly.
I look up. “Colton?”
Frank nods. “He used to stay longer than he needed to. Argue with me. Push back. Like if he worked hard enough, he could outthink reality.”
I smile despite myself. “That sounds like him.”
“Not anymore,” Frank says. “Now he bolts the second it gets too close.”
“He’s hurting,” I say quietly.
Frank sighs. “He’s terrified.”
“Of what?” I ask.
Frank doesn’t answer right away. He stares at the ceiling for a long moment, the humor gone now, replaced with something raw and thoughtful.
“Loss,” he finally says. “The kind you don’t get over. The kind you build your whole life around avoiding.”
A crushing sensation hits my chest.
“He thinks control keeps him safe,” Frank continues. “Rules. Boundaries. Distance. But all it really does is keep him lonely.”
I think of the way Colton’s voice has flattened these past few days. The way he won’t meet Frank’s eyes. The way he barely lets himself breathe in this room.
“He doesn’t know how to stay when he knows the ending,” Frank adds.
I nod slowly. “I do.”
Frank looks at me then, and something like relief crosses his face. “That’s why you scare him.”
He catches me off guard. “Me?”
“You,” he confirms. “You stay, even when it hurts. You don’t disappear just because you know how the story ends.”
I think of Bryce. Of sitting beside his bed. Of holding his hand long after I knew what was coming.
