Epilogue Violet
Epilogue
Violet
Weeks passed. Maybe months.
Time moved differently now, softer. Forgiving. There were times I was still dragged along like wreckage being pulled, but the edges were smooth now, rounded and bearable.
Because every morning I woke up with Grayson beside me.
Every day I came home to see his jacket hanging by the door next to mine.
And that single ordinary thing stopped the spiral before it could begin.
I used to open my eyes knowing what greeted me was absence.
Now I woke up to Grayson smoothing his finger along my brow, gently whispering that we were going to take one day at a time.
Our lives weren’t neat. They weren’t healed. But they were ours. And slowly we were building something that resembled normalcy, or at least as close as people like us could get.
Coffee in the mornings with messy hair, bare feet, sleepy eyes, but genuine smiles on our faces. And sometimes after breakfast we walked the boardwalk hand in hand. I didn’t have to do that alone any longer.
The ghosts of my past still followed, but they no longer dictated my every step or thought.
Some days I still waited for the break to return, for the ground to open up and swallow the fragile peace I had finally found. Healing wasn’t loud or cinematic. But it was a script that I could follow.
It was small and quiet, and it let me take a full breath without feeling guilt or like I didn’t deserve this. I had to trust that everything wouldn’t crash down on me like some sick joke from the world.
Because I sure as hell wouldn’t be punished for existing.
At night, the bed wasn’t too big anymore. Sometimes we laughed over something stupid, or complained about the heater having to be continuously fixed.
And then there were the times when moans and heavy breathing took up space, when we were skin against skin, breath against cheeks, and losing ourselves to each other for a suspended moment.
Other times we said nothing at all, enjoying the kind of silence only found with the one person who felt like home. It was the stillness that didn’t demand words, only presence.
We were learning how to trust again, how to talk through the fractures left behind by his choices and my fear. Some nights the weight of what had happened sat between us like a third heartbeat, but we didn’t look away.
We faced it. Together.
Happiness had been a stranger for so long it felt almost wrong to feel it. But it stayed, and I embraced it.
But not everything was soft. The dark still crept in. There were nights Grayson woke gasping, sweat slicking his skin, the fire and pain still chasing him in dreams.
There were nights I sat upright, heart hammering, convinced they’d find me here . . . take everything away again. Talking about it helped, not just with Grayson, but in my continued appointments with Dr. Afonso. I knew it helped him, too. Grayson seemed lighter after his sessions.
We were learning how to live with the damage, not erase it.
So that was where we were, just two people trying to have a normal life where the darkness couldn’t reach us.
But always in my mind and worries were thoughts of Harper. Her absence didn’t get better as time moved on. It pressed at the edges every day.
I brought myself back to the present and went through the wonderfully normal task of washing the dishes after dinner.
I felt him behind me before he brushed his thumb down the center of my back.
“You okay?”
I looked over my shoulder and nodded. “Better than okay.” He turned me to face him and cupped my face. His thumbs brushed my cheeks, relaxing me in a way no one else ever could.
I loved this man more than I thought humanly possible. And he loved me, even the broken and raw parts that sometimes refused to heal.
“I love you.”
His words broke me open, sharp and clean. I kissed him desperately. His mouth was fierce, warm, and he kissed me like a vow.
When we pulled back, our foreheads rested together, breath mingling. This wasn’t survival anymore.
This was living. It was proof that pain and joy could share the same body, that grief and love could breathe side by side.
The past hadn’t vanished, and it never would. But it no longer owned me . . . us.
It gave us strength to keep moving forward.