“You fixed my garbage disposal without being asked. You reorganized my closet by season. You replaced three lightbulbs in my bathroom before I caught they were out.” I twirled noodles around my fork. “You show love by making things work better. I’ve always known that.”
His face shifted. I’d never seen him like that.
“And yours is physical touch.” His voice softened. “Which is why it hit you so hard when I pulled away. Every time I withdrew, it wasn’t emotional distance. It took everything.”
“Yes.”
He set his curry down. Reached over. Pressed his palm against my chest, right over my heart.
“I’m going to be better about that.”
“You don’t have to be perfect. You just have to stay.”
“I’m staying.”
We talked about the harder things too. His parents. My mom. The way outside voices had crept in like water through cracks we didn’t know we had.
“My dad called last week.”
My whole body went still. “What did he say?”
“He asked how I was doing. Just… that. How was I doing. And then he said he’d been reading some things. He didn’t say what, but,” Ellis turned his fork over in his hands, “he asked if I was happy.”
“What did you tell him?”
“I told him I was getting there.”
I wanted to ask whether “getting there” meant me, or meant us. But I already knew the answer from the way he’d shown up at my door with two containers of food and a willingness to be cracked open on a Thursday night.
“My mom still hasn’t called.” I put it out there, flat and undecorated. No joke attached.
Ellis reached for my hand. Held it.
“That’s her loss.”
“I know. But it still hurts.”
“I know.”
We sat with that. Not fixing it, not running from it, not making it funny. Letting it be a wound that existed between us, acknowledged and hurting and ours.
Later, in bed, Ellis traced the line of my jaw with his thumb.
“I want to meet them.”
“Meet who?”
“Your friends. For real this time. Not hearing about them or seeing pictures. I want to know the people you love.”
I’d been keeping those worlds apart for so long the separation sat structural, load-bearing. Move that wall and everything collapsed.
“What if they don’t…”
“Jett. You’ve told me about these people for months. Sierra, who hauled you through breakdowns at 3 A.M. Calliope, who once threatened to curse a barista for getting your order wrong. Raven, who apparently predicted we’d get back together based on a tarot pull.” He kissed my forehead. “I’m not afraid of them. I’m afraid of being the reason you keep them at a distance.”
He wasn’t wrong. Keeping Ellis separate from The Inner Circle had never been about protecting them. It was about protecting me. If those two worlds collided and it went badly, I’d have nowhere left to hide.
But I was done hiding. We both were. That was supposed to be the whole point.
