Chapter 18
Chapter Eighteen
Mara
I don’t open the shoebox again for three whole weeks.
I tell myself I have other things to prioritize—like interviewing tutors for Mila to help her catch up on subjects we couldn’t cover properly in hotel rooms or temporary rentals.
Apparently, her science skills are “inconsistent,” which is a polite way of saying we couldn’t exactly erupt volcanoes next to the minibar or dissect owl pellets in a kitchenette with one knife.
There are also summer camps I need to look into so we can register before they’re full.
Places where Mila can start making friends, with activity lists long enough to swallow us both—ballet, theater, martial arts, pottery, even a frog preservation society she insists she’s ready to lead.
Everything feels urgent, vital, something to throw myself into.
All of it takes precedence over figuring out my aunt’s little secret tucked away in that shoebox.
And honestly?
I don’t think the box is even that important. That’s probably just some major gossip that I missed because my family likes to keep secrets. Between the tiny details she left behind.
Trying to adjust to the new life seems a little more pressing. I’m making dinners again, which still throws me. The last time I cooked a formal dinner was that evening, when I got that call—the one that split my life in two.
I watch the phone out of the corner of my eye as I chop, checking between stirs of the pan for a message that never comes. Obviously, therapy is back on my calendar because Mila can’t have a mother who keeps outrunning the grief she refused to face five years ago.
Being here, being home—whatever “home” means—feels like walking through tunnels I shut the doors on. Like each day is another spot on the map I promised myself I’d never revisit.
During meals, Mila and I naturally talk about possible activities and frogs.
She’s slightly obsessed with them. We brush our teeth, read a chapter from her book, negotiate bedtime.
She wins an extra ten minutes and falls asleep in five.
It’s a balancing act, but I keep telling myself I’m managing better than I expected. Actually, I’m rocking it.
If I’m not . . . well, no one needs to know that part.
Every night, once the apartment settles into its quiet hum, I carry another box to the balcony.
This is usually when Alec wanders out onto his own balcony with the subtlety of a man who pretends he’s not waiting for something.
We’ve been cataloguing the vinyl together—well, I sort them, and he critiques them. We’re planning on finding a shelf to display them properly, though he keeps calling certain albums “worthy of eternal devotion,” which I’m pretty sure is code for his favorite mixtape inspirations.
Last night he borrowed a stack—again. I’m expecting him to show up with some mixtape and a smug speech about how he “rescued real music from the digital apocalypse.” I don’t know if I believe half the nonsense he says, but I’ll still hand over whatever albums he falls in love with.
He calls himself “eclectic.” I call him a snob.
As if on cue, his door slides open.
“You’re already going through the next box?” He appears, arms crossed, pretending he didn’t time this.
“You wanna help?” I tilt my head toward the living room. “The penthouse’s door is open. You can just come in.”
He huffs. It’s not quite irritation, not quite resignation. My open-door habit bothers him, mostly because I don’t lock it. But why would I? We have a doorman who screens everyone coming up to this floor. And really, Alec’s the only person who could walk in without knocking. Not that he does it.
I may have told him it was good practice “in case of an emergency.”
Okay, I absolutely made that up on the spot.
But it worked because he stopped arguing.
He steps onto my balcony. His gaze lands on the shoebox I set in one of the chairs.
“Is that the thing with the letters you mentioned last night?”
“Yep. I’ve only read two of them.”
He sits beside the vinyl box instead, handing me a cassette. “I finished this today. But obviously this is just the beginning.”
“The beginning?” I ask, amused.
“Your music education,” he says solemnly, like he’s about to knight me. “You’ve survived without it, but it’s time.”
A laugh bursts out of me. “I know music, Mr. Snob.”
“It’s not snobbery,” he says. “It’s having great taste.”
“You call it great taste,” I say, “but you rolled your eyes at my aunt’s White Lion album.”
“That’s because White Lion had talent, but zero cohesion. It was like listening to a genius getting interrupted every thirty seconds.”
“They were good,” I insist.
He stares at me, horrified. “We’re going to have to have a long conversation about your choices.”
“Oh, please. You’re the one who said your Echo & The Bunnymen album ‘spoke to your soul.’”
His ears actually turn pink. “They’re brilliant and misunderstood.”
“You said it changed your life.”
“I never went that far. An album that changed my life would be Led Zeppelin IV. Bonham taught half of us how to breathe behind a kit. Or Who’s Next. Keith Moon made drums feel like a living thing. He rewired my brain.”
I lift a brow. “So now we’re talking about breathing lessons?”
He scoffs. “It’s called musical education. Something you clearly missed while listening to your aunt’s . . . what was it? White Lion?”
“You’re still offended?”
“I’m not offended.” He crosses his arms. “I’m just saying, if you want to understand greatness, you don’t start with glam bands who wrote lyrics like they were filling out a Valentine’s Day card.”
“Oh, please,” I say. “You’re the one who said Echo & The Bunnymen rewired your emotional DNA.”
“I never said DNA.”
“You implied it.”
“I implied nothing.”
“You stared at the ceiling for a full minute afterward.”
“That was—” His jaw clenches. “Fine. Maybe I was thinking about something.”
“Something,” I repeat, grinning. “Like your soul speaking?”
He points a cassette at me. “You’re enjoying this too much.”
“Absolutely.”
“You don’t even know that album.”
“I don’t need to. I saw your face.”
He narrows his eyes. “You mocked Bonham, didn’t you?”
“I didn’t,” I gasp. “I said he looked sweaty.”
“He was performing.” Alec throws a hand up as if the universe personally offended him. “You try playing drums under stage lights. You’d melt.”
“Wow. Dramatic.”
“It’s not dramatic. It’s factual.” He taps his sternum a couple of times. “I’ve lived it.”
Then, he leans closer, and suddenly he’s too near, too intense, too him. “Do you want this mixtape or not?”
“Is that even a question?”
He holds it just out of reach. I lunge for it. He lifts it higher, expression infuriatingly smug.
“Alec.”
“What? I need to confirm you’re worthy.”
“I’m literally cataloguing my aunt’s vinyl collection with you. Isn’t that worthy enough?”
Something shifts across his features—quick, small, unexpected. Not quite vulnerability . . . more like surprise. A note he’s not used to playing. Then—because moments like this one seems to short-circuit him—he clears his throat and thrusts the tape toward me.
“Here,” he mutters.
I take it carefully. “Does this one speak to my soul too?”
“You’re never going to let that go, are you?”
“You’re too intense,” I confess.
“Music speaks to our souls,” he insists. “It does. You just have to let it in.”
“You make me sound emotionally stunted,” I say, half teasing, half terrified he’s right.
He scoffs. Not mean—more like he can’t help it.
“Funny.”
“What’s funny?” I ask, bracing for an insult.
“I’m the one with emotional issues,” he says, “and I can let music flow through me. What’s your excuse?”
I look at the boxes.
The records.
The letters.
The grief I keep pushing to the side, like rearranging it will make it easier to carry.
Am I emotionally constipated?
Possibly.
His gaze flicks to the shoebox like it’s calling to him. “You really haven’t opened the rest of the letters?” He points lightly.
The shift in topic throws me. “Not yet.”
“Why?”
I swallow, eyes drifting toward the shoebox. “Because I’m afraid of what happened to Thomas.”
He doesn’t say anything.
He just stays there beside me. The mist-sweet air drifts between us, the city humming below like it’s listening in.
“Want company when you do?” he asks finally.
The way he says it makes something inside me still.
It’s not a push. It's more like him offering a little room to breathe, if I want it.
I breathe out. “Would you stay?”
He nods once.
“Okay.” My voice is a little thin. “Just one. Maybe two. Then we talk music.”
“You don’t have to,” he says, softer now. “Not tonight.”
“If not today, when?” I whisper, lifting the lid.
My fingers find an envelope—thin, careful, almost trembling from time.
The postmark is blurred. September 1967.
The edges have softened.
The crease has grown pale from being opened and closed too many times.
Alec stays still beside me.
I unfold it.