63 francesca
These have been the longest two weeks of my life. But now- suddenly- it feels like everything is moving too fast.
Christian: At the jail. Picking him up in a few minutes.
I reread it at least five times, my hands shaking so badly I need to sit down.
Christian has been with David all day.
Last week, he got Jamie’s former cellmate a sit-down with detectives and, between that statement and one of his dad’s guys flipping for immunity, the state finally dropped the charges. Since then, it’s been nothing but bureaucracy. Forms. Signatures. Approvals. Endless waiting.
But now that part is over.
The plan is simple: the second Jamie walks out, he goes straight back to the police station- this time voluntarily- to give his statement and help lock the case against his father down for good.
Christian insisted I stay home. Said Jamie wouldn’t be able to focus if I was there. That this needed to happen cleanly and quickly, without distractions.
I said I understood.
And I do. Mostly.
Ryan went to work. Teachers only get so many personal days and, now that we know there’ll be a trial, he’s hoarding every spare hour he can.
So I’m here. Alone.
I’ve cleaned the kitchen twice, checked my phone approximately a hundred thousand times, and folded and refolded every towel in the house for no reason.
The only thing keeping me from fully crawling out of my skin is knowing Jamie is coming home.
Home. To me.
I just have to be patient.
Which feels impossible, because I’m fairly certain time has never moved this slowly in the history of humanity.
My phone vibrates and I see a text from Christian on the group text.
Christian: Headed home.
Ryan: Great- I’ll be home in about thirty.
Christian thumbs up Ryan’s text.
Ryan: Anything you want for dinner, Jamie?
Jamie: Anything not out of a can will be a nice change.
All the air leaves my lungs.
Seeing his name on my phone- seeing him texting- makes my heart stutter. I know it makes sense. Of course he’d get his phone back, his property returned. But it still feels unreal.
My fingers hover over the screen, trembling, and I can’t think of a single thing to say.
So I don’t.
I just stand in the foyer and wait, tears filling my eyes, frozen to the spot, listening for the sound of a car pulling into the driveway, every second stretching too long.
When it finally comes, my breath catches so hard it almost hurts. I can already feel tears spilling, that tight, burn at the back of my throat.
The doorknob turns.
The door opens.
And he’s there.
He looks tired. Thinner. But he’s still so achingly, impossibly beautiful.
“Hey, Frankie girl,” he says.
It’s his voice that breaks me.
My knees give out, but he’s already there, catching me, his arms wrapping tight around me as we slide down the wall together. I cling to him, barely aware of anything except the solid, familiar weight of him, the warmth, the fact that he’s real and here and not behind glass anymore.
“I’m here, Frankie,” he murmurs into my hair, his voice low and steady. “It’s okay. I’m here. It’s over.”
He keeps saying it, over and over, soft and certain, until the words start to settle somewhere deep inside me.
It’s over.
Not just the nightmare of him being arrested. Not just the waiting, the fear, the constant, suffocating panic.
Gary.
Gary is gone.
I haven’t let myself think about that- not really. There hasn’t been space. Everything has been Jamie. Survival. Getting him out.
But now there’s space. There’s time to reflect on the fact that Gary is dead. Gone. Forever this time.
“He’s… gone,” I say, my voice barely more than a breath. “Gary’s gone.”
Jamie stills against me.
“Yeah,” he says after a moment, quiet and careful. “He is.”
I press my face into his chest, shaking, the weight of it finally settling in.
“It’s really over,” I whisper.
At some point, Ryan comes in, but I don’t hear him. I only realize we’re not alone when I feel it- the shift, the presence- when I become dimly aware that they’re all there, surrounding me on the floor of the front hallway, like none of us quite knows how to stand yet.
~
That first night, all we do is hold each other.
We crawl into bed together and stay there, tangled up in limbs and warmth, clinging tighter than seems possible without cutting off circulation.
I keep my face tucked against Jamie’s chest, listening to his heartbeat until it slows enough that I can finally sleep.
In the morning, life cautiously restarts.
Christian insists- gently but firmly- that we try to resume our normal lives. That we don’t let Gary or Jamie’s dad steal anything more from us, including our time.
It’s a nice idea. A little aspirational, given that I’ve never exactly nailed down what normal looks like.
But we try.
Ryan gets up first and goes to work, kissing my forehead and clapping Jamie lightly on the shoulder before he leaves. Christian laces up his shoes and goes for a run, comes back flushed and focused, then disappears into his new office to do… whatever it is he does all day.
Jamie and I are still in bed.
Sunlight spills across the sheets. The house feels quiet in a way it hasn’t for weeks- not empty, just calm.
He’s tracing lazy shapes on my stomach with his fingertips.
“Are we going to be lazy sloths all day?” I ask, smiling down at him.
He hums thoughtfully. “Tempting.”
Then, after a moment, “But first, I want to take a shower.”
I raise an eyebrow. “Another one? You’ve already taken two.”
“Yeah,” he says, voice low, honest. “I just… can’t get that place off me.”
My chest tightens. I wrap my arms around him, holding him close, trying to imagine what it must feel like to be there. To think you were going to lose everything, spend your life there, locked away forever.
He lifts his head from where it’s tucked against my chest and looks at me.
“Join me?”