I hardly register the sound of my phone hitting the floor.
CHAPTER 33
LIKE STARING INTO THE SUN.
BILLIE
The kitchen smellsincredible. Whatever Darcy’s doing with that feta sauce has no business smelling this good, and I tell him as much while I steal a piece of asparagus from the tray. It took us a moment to cool off from our kiss, but then his stomach rumbled so loudly, we both burst out laughing.
“Hey. Those are for the grill.” He points the spoon he’s using to make the sauce at me.
“Hm. Quality control.” I hop onto the counter, swinging my legs as I watch him work. He’s calm in the kitchen. Methodical. It reminds me of how he is with numbers. Everything measured, everything in its place. It’s the opposite of how I function, and it’s annoyingly attractive.
“So,” I start, popping another asparagus spear into my mouth before he can stop me, “are we feeling confident about tonight’s meal, or should I have the bread and cheese on standby?”
I’m teasing. Obviously, I’m teasing. The grilled cheese incident has become one of my favorite memories of us. When he stood at the sink, sleeves rolled up, scrubbing a pot, like it hadpersonally offended him, while I buttered bread and pretended the smoke alarm hadn’t gone off? Hot. Also, it was the first time things felt so easy between us that I forgot this was temporary. It was so… normal. The kind of normal I’ve always craved but never quite trusted to last.
But the joke doesn’t land the way I expect it to.
His hands stop moving. Not slowly, not a natural pause between tasks. They just… stop. The spoon hovers over the bowl, and his knuckles go white around it.
“Darcy?”
Nothing.
“Peter?” I try again.
His chest rises sharply, and when it falls, it shudders on the way down. The color drains from his face so fast it’s like watching someone pull a plug.
“Hey.” I slide off the counter, my bare feet hitting the cool floor. “Peter, what’s?—”
“I’m fine.”
He’s not fine. His voice is thin and stretched, like a wire about to snap. His breathing has gone shallow and fast in a way that makes my own chest tighten. The spoon clatters into the bowl, and he grips the edge of the counter with both hands.
I’ve never seen him like this. In all the weeks I’ve known this man—his genuine smile, his stupid jokes, how easily he makes everyone around him feel like the most important person in the room—I have never once seen him look like he’s drowning on dry land.
But I recognize it.
Not the exact shape of it. I don’t know what his version feels like. But I know what it’s like when your body turns against you. When the thing that’s supposed to keep you alive—your brain, your breath, your heartbeat—suddenly decides to betray you. I know what it’s like to be sitting in your truck in a parking lot,gripping the steering wheel because your chest hurts so badly you’re convinced something is physically wrong. I know what it’s like to cancel on people you love because the weight of existing that day is too heavy to carry into someone else’s space. I know the particular loneliness of falling apart in a way nobody around you can see.
My version comes with a calendar. Two weeks of feeling like myself—mostly capable, sharp, someone who can run a crew and swing a hammer and hold her own—and then the slow, familiar slide into a body and brain I barely recognize.
The PMDD turns the volume up on everything my ADHD already makes loud. The anxiety becomes a roar. The sadness becomes a bottomless pit. And the worst part isn’t the feeling itself—it’s the knowing. Knowing it’s coming. Knowing it’ll pass. And still not being able to stop it from swallowing me whole every single time.
So no, I don’t know what Peter’s feeling like right now, but I know what it is to be trapped inside yourself with no way out.
And I know nearly every single person I’ve ever let see me in that state has either tried to fix me or left.
My first instinct is to touch him, but something stops me. I don’t know if touch is the right thing. I don’t know if talking is the right thing. I don’t know anything about the clinical side of this, and the realization that I could make it worse roots me to the spot for a long, terrible second.
But then I think about what I’d want. Not the advice. Not the problem-solving. Not the wide-eyed panic on someone’s face that makes you feel like a burden on top of everything else you’re already feeling. Someone not treating it like a fire to put out. Someonestaying.
So I stop thinking and start moving.
I step closer, not in front of him but beside him, and I press my shoulder against his arm. Not grabbing, not pulling, justletting him know I’m here. When everything feels like too much, sometimes you need proof the ground is still under your feet. I’ve spent entire PMDD episodes curled up on the bathroom floor because the tile was cold and solid and real. The least I can do is be something solid for him.
“I’m not going anywhere,” I tell him quietly. “And the potatoes aren’t in yet, so we’ve got time.”
