Chapter 31 – Alise
Chapter Thirty-One
Alise
“Iswear to God, if you don’t finish typing the menu and RSVP cards in the next twenty minutes, the wedding is canceled, and we’re eloping,” Ramona snaps, one hand buried in a pile of envelopes, the other gripping a gold calligraphy pen like it’s the only thing holding her back from a full spiral.
“You aren’t eloping,” I murmur, eyes locked on my laptop screen. “The aunties would revolt, not to mention Cooper will throw a fit at not being able to see you come down the aisle in a pretty white dress.”
“I really love my dress.” Ramona pauses, with the same wistful look I’m sure she had when she said yes to the dress.
“Exactly. So shut up and let me focus. This is your fault for banning me from changing the font.”
“You have changed the font twenty-seven million times already,” she deadpans. “The only opinion that matters is mine, and I like it.”
“Are we turning into a bridezilla now?” I ask, trying to summon something like humor, but my voice comes out thinner than I want.
“No. And even if I were, you still wouldn’t be able to stop obsessing over the damn font.”
“I’m doing my best.” I sigh, pressing a thumb into the edge of the meal cards until the paper creases beneath it.
I focus on the pressure, on how good it feels to ruin something small when everything else is slipping through my fingers.
“What the hell is a meal card anyway, and why do I need to pick a fish logo?”
“You don’t,” Michele says from across the kitchen table, casually pressing wax seals like we’re sealing letters for the queen. “You just need to pick a font and stop sighing like your cat died.”
“I don’t have a cat.” The words come out flat, with no real force behind them.“Maybe I should get one.”
“You’re not fooling anyone,” she says gently, no teasing in her voice. “And you’re not changing the subject either.”
They’re all watching me—Ramona, with her narrowed eyes, Michele, with her softly raised brow, and Darius, from the couch with a half-eaten slice of pizza paused midair like he’s sensing a storm rolling in.
I want to look away, but I can’t. Not with the pressure building in my chest, making it almost impossible to breathe.
“I’d just like to point out that Auntie Alise hasn’t looked at her computer screen for more than a few seconds for the last twenty minutes,” Darius says, like a commentator watching a drama unfold.
“The only time I’ve seen her even glance at the table is to stab a toothpick into that cheese cube with judgment. ”
“That’s not true,” I lie, shifting my gaze. “And it’s not my fault Michele brought the good cheese from the fancy grocery store near the stadium. I love good cheese.”
“It is some damn good cheese,” Ramona mutters, popping a cube into her mouth. “But he isn’t wrong; you can’t focus on anything. Spill it, Alise.”
I grip the edge of the table harder, my pulse hammering in my ears. I try to breathe around it, but my lungs are tight, shallow.
“It’s Beau.”
Darius perks up like someone just flipped the channel to his favorite drama. “Oh, did he finally get arrested for his ‘emotional menace’ status?”
“What?”
“Never mind.” He waves a hand, returning his focus to the television.
“What happened?” Michele asks, sitting straighter.
“Things were going so well,” Ramona adds, frowning.
“They were,” I whisper, still rubbing the corner of the cardstock back and forth. I watch the paper bend and unbend, pretending it’s enough to hold me together. “And then he just… disappeared.”
No one says a word. It’s so quiet that I can hear the hum of the heat as it clicks on, but it’s not a comfortable silence; it feels like it’s waiting for something to break.
“No phone calls. No stopping by the rink. I haven’t seen him for two weeks.”
“Two weeks?” Ramona echoes, her voice no longer sharp, but cautious.
I nod. My throat feels raw, like every word I’ve swallowed over the last few days is clawing its way up now.
“I’ve gotten like four texts. All short and vague. One of them was a thumbs-up emoji.”
“Oh, no.” Michele lets out a noise like someone punched her in the gut. “The emotional equivalent of a passive wave from across the street.”
“And Cooper said Beau missed film review. Practiced… barely. And there was a game last weekend, and Beau showed up looking like shit. Cooper’s not even sure if he’s playing this week.”
The quiet that follows is thick and suffocating. My hands are trembling now, so I slide them under the table and clasp them together tight, like I can hold back the unraveling.
“Hendrix boys don’t skip practice.” Michele scoots her chair closer, wrapping her arm around my shoulder, eyes narrowing. “I’m sure my dad had a field day with that.”
“Exactly,” I whisper.
My heart is beating faster now, a flutter of panic beneath my skin. It doesn’t feel like nerves, more like dread that something bad has already happened, and I’m only just catching up.
“So he ghosted you and benched himself? That’s a breakup or a breakdown.” Darius whistles.
“He didn’t ghost me,” I say quickly, but even to my own ears, it sounds like I’m trying to convince myself. “He wouldn’t.”
“You sure?” Michele asks gently but pointedly.
I open my mouth to answer, but no words come out.
Because I’m not sure. At least not anymore.
This feels like abandonment dressed in politeness.
It’s like someone closing a door one inch at a time and hoping you don’t notice until it’s locked.
And I thought we were past pretending, the almost, and the what-ifs.
So why does it feel like he’s vanishing again, but this time slower, quieter?
“Alise, what are you afraid of?” Ramona nudges my hand.
“That I was wrong. That I believed this was something real when it wasn’t. That he got better—got back on the ice, got his life together—and realized he didn’t need me anymore.”
I stare at her, then at the silver ink on the cards, and the letters blur.
“Yeah, fuck no. There is no way Beau would do something like that. He lov—cares about you. We all know that. Maybe he is having a hard time again, but instead of leaning on you like he used to do, he’s trying to get through it on his own, but don’t you dare try to convince yourself he stopped caring. ”
“But why wouldn’t he tell someone?” I whisper.
That’s what keeps circling through my mind. Not the silence. The fact that it’s the man who used to call just to hear my voice before bed. The one who swore he’d show up for me even on the bad days, and now he’s just… gone.
“I’ll text him,” Michele says, already pulling out her phone. “I’ll ask if he’s being held hostage by his own emotional constipation.”
“Give me that.” I grab the phone and hide it under my thigh. “Don’t you dare.”
“We’re trying to help,” Ramona says.
“You guys are no help.” I manage a laugh, but it comes out jagged and wet. My chest feels like a balloon with a slow leak, deflating while I try to smile.
“We’re the emotional SWAT team,” Michele chimes in. “Snacks, sarcasm, and backup. That’s our love language.”
I blink fast, willing the tears to behave as Ramona leans in, her voice barely a whisper now.
“If something was really wrong, don’t you think he would’ve told you?”
That question hits like a punch because I thought he would. I thought we were past secrets and shadows. I thought… maybe this time, I could trust the ground beneath me. But silence is a language I’ve learned too well. And this feels like a goodbye spoken over days instead of him using his words.
“I just… thought we were getting somewhere, building something.”
“You were,” Ramona says, her voice fierce in a way that makes my heart clench.
“Then why does it feel like I’m being slowly erased?”
“Okay. Let’s regroup.” Michele bumps my elbow gently. “Do you want to storm his apartment? Call him out via meme? Or stage a dramatic declaration of discontent at the next home game with matching signs and coordinated outfits?”
I let out a laugh, but it doesn’t stick. It slides right off my tongue and disappears before I can hold on to it. “I don’t know. Maybe I’m overreacting.”
“Even if you are—which I don’t think you are—he still needs to know he’s fucking up,” Ramona says, her voice iron-edged. “Big time.”
“I just…” I drag my thumbnail over the edge of the table. “I don’t want to be that girl. The one who panics the second someone pulls away.”
“Newsflash,” Michele says, softer now, her voice wrapping around me like a blanket that doesn’t ask questions. “You’re the girl who notices when something’s wrong. That’s not panic. That’s your gut telling you to pay attention.”
“And honestly? I trust your intuition more than I trust most people’s Google search histories,” Darius pipes up from the couch, not looking away from the screen.
“Thanks, I think.” I huff a little, the corner of my mouth twitching despite everything.
Ramona reaches across the table and takes my hand. “Call him. Again. Text him. Again. Show up at his front door and demand answers, or don’t, but whatever you decide, do it because it feels right, not because you’re scared of losing something that won’t fight to stay.”
The words land in my chest like stones dropped into water.
Heavy. Spreading ripples through everything I’ve been trying to hold still.
I bite the inside of my cheek, hard enough to sting, but it doesn’t ground me like I want it to.
I want to believe he’d fight. That he’d hear the silence between us and claw his way back through it.
That this—whatever this distance is—is just a bump, a momentary lapse in something real.
But right now, it feels like I’m the only one still reaching.
And the silence on the other end? It’s sounding an awful lot like goodbye.
The silence hangs heavy over us, the air thick with tension, and we are all too polite to say that we’re choking on it. And then Darius lurches up like he’s been electrocuted, knocking his soda can sideways.
“OH, SHIT!”