20. Willow
— ? —
Willow
I wake to voices down the hall.
Not arguing, laughing. The sound drifts through my door, unfamiliar enough to make me pause. When was the last time I heard laughter in this house?
I make my way to the kitchen, following the sound, and stop dead in the doorway.
Glenn is at the stove, still wearing yesterday’s clothes, his hair sticking up at improbable angles.
Corey sits at the table in an equally disheveled state, nursing a cup of coffee with the careful movements of someone managing a hangover.
They’re not looking at each other, but the silence between them isn’t hostile.
It’s another thing entirely, one that looks almost like peace.
“What is this?”
They both look up, Glenn with guilt, Corey with something softer.
“Glenn stayed over,” Corey explains. “We got to talking and he had too much to drink to drive.”
“You got drunk. Together.” I move into the kitchen slowly, not sure what to make of this development. “You and Glenn got drunk together.”
“We found common ground.” Glenn flips what smells like bacon in a pan. “Turns out we’re both idiots who’ve made terrible decisions regarding the people we love. It’s surprisingly good bonding material.”
I lower myself into a chair at the table, one hand resting on my belly. The baby has been more active this week, flutters that remind me constantly of the life growing inside me.
“How are you feeling?” Corey asks. The question has become automatic between us, but there’s genuine concern in his voice.
“Better. The nausea’s finally starting to ease.” It’s true, the past two weeks have been the most normal I’ve felt since this nightmare began. “The doctor says I’m past the worst of it.”
“That’s good.” He smiles, tentative and hopeful. “That’s really good news.”
Glenn sets a plate in front of me, scrambled eggs, perfectly soft, with crispy bacon and toast. My favorites.
“Glenn, you didn’t have to…”
“I wanted to.” He takes the seat across from Corey, and the three of us sit there in the morning light like it’s the most ordinary morning of our lives. Like we haven’t all been through hell to get here.
“Did you just stop being jealous because you know he’s gay now?”
The question comes out before I can stop it, directed at Corey. I’ve been wondering for weeks, turning it over in my mind.
He sets down his coffee cup. Takes his time answering.
“No,” he says finally. “I mean, yes, knowing the truth helped. Obviously. But it’s more than that.
” He pauses, gathering his thoughts. “In therapy, I’ve been working on understanding why I was so jealous in the first place.
And the answer is that it wasn’t really about Glenn.
It was about me. My fear that I wasn’t enough.
My certainty that you’d eventually realize you could do better and leave. ”
“That’s surprisingly self-aware,” Glenn observes.
“I’ve had a lot of time to think.”
“So what changed?” I press. “What made you finally see it?”
“Losing you.” He meets my eyes, and the vulnerability there makes my breath catch.
“When you walked out that door, when I realized what I’d done, it was like looking in a mirror for the first time.
I didn’t like what I saw. The jealousy, the suspicion, the way I’d turned your love into evidence against you.
That wasn’t the man I wanted to be. That was my mother’s voice in my head, telling me that nobody would ever love me without wanting something in return. ”
“And you think you’ve changed? Just like that?”
“No.” He shakes his head. “I think I’ve started changing.
I think I understand what needs to change, even if I’m not all the way there yet.
The fears don’t disappear just because you recognize them.
But I’m working on it. Every day. Therapy every week.
Actually sitting with my feelings instead of running from them.
” He pauses. “I can’t promise I’ll never feel jealous again.
But I can promise I’ll never act on it the way I did before.
I’ll talk to you. I’ll trust you. Even when my brain is screaming that something’s wrong, I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt that I should have given you from the beginning. ”
The sincerity in his voice is unmistakable. This isn’t the Corey I’ve known for twelve years, the one who kept everything locked inside, who dealt with emotions by working longer hours or throwing money at problems. This is someone new. Someone trying to become better.
“The night you told me about the stalking,” I say slowly, “I was so angry I wanted to burn the house down. I wanted to hurt you the way you’d hurt me. But Glenn told me something that stuck with me.”
“What?”
I glance at Glenn, who’s suddenly very interested in his eggs. “He told me about a time he almost destroyed his relationship with John. How he followed him, went through his phone, convinced himself of something that wasn’t true.”
Corey’s eyes widen slightly. “He told you that?”
“He said John forgave him. That they had five more years together after that, and they were the best five years of his life.” I swallow hard. “And now John’s gone, and Glenn would give anything for five more minutes with him. Even if he had to spend those minutes apologizing.”
The kitchen is very quiet.
“I keep thinking about that,” I continue. “About how fragile everything is. How quickly it can all be taken away. And I keep asking myself, if something happened to you tomorrow, how would I feel about the way we left things? Would I regret spending these months pushing you away?”
“Would you?”
“Yes.” The word comes out as a whisper. “I would regret it for the rest of my life. I’d hate myself for letting my pain and my pride keep me from at least trying.”
Corey’s eyes are bright with unshed tears. “Willow, what are you saying?”
“I’m saying…” I stop. Take a breath. Start again. “I’m saying I want to try. Really try. Not just coexisting in the same house, but actually working on this. Couples therapy. Ground rules. The understanding that I might never fully trust you again, and you have to be okay with that.”
“I’m okay with that.” His voice is thick. “I’m okay with anything that means I get to keep trying.”
“It won’t be easy. I’m still angry sometimes. Still hurt. There will be days when I look at you and see the man who followed me to that restaurant, who stood in our kitchen and called our baby someone else’s.”
“I know.”
“And if you ever do anything like that again…”
“I won’t.” He cuts me off, fierce and certain. “I swear to you, Willow. I will never let my fear hurt you like that again. Even if it kills me to stay silent, I’ll talk to you first. I’ll trust you first.”
Glenn clears his throat. “This feels like a private moment. I should probably…”
“Stay.” I catch his hand before he can stand. “You’re part of this, Glenn. Whether you like it or not. You’re family.”
His eyes fill. “Willow…”
“John would be proud of you.” My voice breaks on the words. “Helping me through this. Being there for me even when you were drowning in your own grief. He’d be so proud of the man you are.”
Glenn doesn’t respond. He just squeezes my hand and lets the tears fall.
We sit there in silence, the three of us, bound by loss and love and the fragile hope that maybe, maybe, things can get better.
“I want to kiss you.”
Corey’s voice is rough, sudden, and my heart stutters in my chest.
“I want to hold you and kiss you and tell you I love you,” he continues.
“But I know I haven’t earned that. So I’m just, I’m going to say it.
I love you, Willow. I’ve loved you since I was eighteen years old.
And I will spend the rest of my life proving that love, even if I never get to hold you again. ”
The words crack something open inside me.
Before I can think, before I can talk myself out of it, I’m on my feet. I’m crossing the distance between us. I’m pulling his face down to mine.
The kiss is everything.
It’s desperate and hungry and three months of denial exploding all at once. His hands come up to cup my face like I’m fragile, like he’s terrified of breaking me. I grab fistfuls of his shirt, pulling him closer, needing to feel him solid and real against me.
When we finally break apart, we’re both breathing hard. My lips are swollen. His eyes are dark.
“That was…” he starts.
“A moment of weakness.” I step back, putting distance between us, trying to rebuild the walls he just demolished. “It changes nothing.”
His face falls.
“I mean it, Corey. One kiss doesn’t erase what happened. We still have so much work to do. This doesn’t mean everything’s fixed.”
“I know.” His voice is steadier now, though I can see the hope warring with caution in his eyes. “I know it doesn’t. But can I just, can I say one thing?”
“What?”
“That was our first kiss in three months. And it felt like coming home.” He swallows hard. “Whatever else happens, whatever work we still need to do, I want you to know that kissing you will always feel like coming home to me.”
I don’t know what to say. I don’t know what to feel. Everything is too big, too raw, too overwhelming.
Glenn clears his throat again, very pointedly. “I should definitely leave now.”
“Glenn…”
“No, really.” He stands, reaching for his jacket. “You two have a lot to talk about, and I have a foundation to run and probably a brutal hangover to sleep off.” He pauses at the doorway. “For what it’s worth? I think you’re going to be okay. Both of you. Maybe even together.”
He’s gone before either of us can respond.
Corey and I stand in the kitchen, the space between us charged with everything that’s been said and everything still waiting.
“What happens now?” he asks.
“Now?” I move back toward the table, putting furniture between us.
I need the distance. I need to think clearly, and I can’t do that when he’s close enough to touch.
“Now we eat breakfast. And then we call a couples therapist. And then we start the long, hard, probably painful work of figuring out if this marriage can be saved.”
“And the kiss?”