SIXTY-THREE
CALLUM
My palms are sweaty, heart hammering like I’ve just run a code. I’ve rehearsed this moment a hundred different ways—hug her, don’t hug her, joke about my absence, act like the last six weeks weren’t the longest of my life. But as the car slows, everything rehearsed scatters like papers in a gust.
When we finally pull up, I pay the driver and step into the salty evening air. Her house feels both familiar and strange. My knock barely lands before the door swings open.
Jordie stands there barefoot, in plaid pajama pants and an oversized T-shirt sliding off one shoulder. There’s flour on her cheek. Her hair looks like it fought the weather. And lost.
“Welcome back!” She grins, and before I can answer, she grabs my collar and pulls me inside. The door slams shut—then she’s airborne, legs hooked around my waist, arms around my neck.
“Jordie . . .” My voice cracks like a pre-pubescent boy.
“Shh,” she mumbles into my shoulder. “I’m a koala.”
A laugh bubbles out of me. I hold her close. She smells of cherry blossoms and warmth—like home. When she slides back down, her hair brushes against my jaw. Her eyes bright, like she’s been waiting for me all day.
“You’ve got flour on your face.” I swipe my thumb gently across her cheek, lingering longer than I should. She doesn’t seem to mind.
She grins unapologetically, “Dinner’s almost ready. Just need to set the table.”
“I’ll help. You shouldn’t overexert yourself.”
“Callum,” she lifts a brow. “I’m two months post-op. Back to work. No pain. Let me spoil you without turning it into a clinical discussion. Go sit on the couch.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
I sink onto the couch with a huff and a smile. The cushions smell like her shampoo and salt air, and her throw blanket is bunched in the corner like she abandoned a nap.
My eyes catch on a yellow journal on the coffee table—hardcover, cracked spine, worn edges.
I pick it up. “This yours?”
Jordie looks over her shoulder from the kitchen. “Yeah. Gratitude journal. Therapist’s idea.”
I flip through it carefully. “Can I . . .?”
“You can read it,” she says.
The entries are short. Ordinary. Honest.Leith sang. It was crap, but it made my day.Rockstar parking at the clinic today.I baked cookies. It didn’t hurt.
And scattered through every page—my name.Callum called.Callum laughed. It’s the best sound in the world.Callum is coming back. Finally.
These aren’t just entries. They’re echoes. Of her trying. Surviving. Reaching for me in the dark, again and again. And me—threaded through them—not as an afterthought, but something constant. Something safe.
I close the book gently.
In the kitchen, she’s plating up dinner as if she hasn’t just torn open my chest and tucked herself inside.
We’re having dinner. Jordie is recounting last week’s karaoke night at Leith’s penthouse. Disco lights. Bluetooth mic. Leith performing Teenage Dirtbag like it was the Grammy’s.
“When he used to visit me in Sydney,” she says, smiling into her fork, “I’d drag him to these dingy karaoke bars in Newtown. He’d sulk the whole walk there but when Livin’ on a Prayer plays, he steals the mic and refuses to give it back.”
I don’t say anything. Just listen. Watch the way her eyes dance when she talks about it.
She spears a piece of roast veg. “Mine was rage-singing Complicated by Avril Lavigne. Peak millennial angst.”
I grin. “Fitting.”
“Right? My therapist would probably say it’s symbolic of my emotional repression—but honestly, it just slaps.”
I laugh. “So . . . therapy’s going okay?”
She sets her fork down, her expression softening. “It’s good. Hard, but good.”
I stay quiet, giving her room.
“My therapist’s got me doing these small things. Like keeping a gratitude journal. Helps me focus on little wins instead of spiraling into existential dread.”
“Has it helped?”
She nods. “Yeah. I didn’t realize how much I was holding on to . . . until I started letting it out. I got so used to expecting the worst that I figured—if I sabotaged everything first, at least I’d be in control of the fallout.”
Her voice dips at the end, not ashamed, just honest. Raw.
I don’t rush her. I just listen. Her courage speaks louder than anything I could say.
“I’m proud of you, Jordie.”
She scoffs lightly, but there’s color rising in her cheeks. “Don’t get too excited. It’s not like I’ve reached Zen master.”
“I don’t need Zen. I like you exactly as you are.”
Her fingers tense around nothing. Then she reaches for her water.
“There’s something I wanted to tell you tonight,” I say carefully.
She pauses. “Is this work-related? Or, like, nuclear fallout?”
“Somewhere in between.” I meet her gaze. “I asked my parents if they’d consider moving to Townsville.”
Her eyes widen. I go on.
“I found them a flat near mine. Quiet. Small. There’s a dumpling shop on The Strand they can run a few days a week if they want. They’ve been ready to slow down.”
“That’s huge! Their Chinatown restaurant was everything.”
“They’ll still cook,” I smile. “Just for fun.”
“That’s really beautiful, Callum. You must be happy.”
“I am.” I hesitate. “But I need you to know—I’m not doing this because of you. It’s not about expectations or trying to push something. I’m staying because I want to. For me. And if I get to be here for you, as your friend, or—” I stop, heart racing. “I’ll take whatever you’re willing to give.”
She stares at me. Then nods. “I don’t think you’re pushing anything. And I think what you’re doing? For them? For yourself? It’s amazing.”
“You’re not mad?”
She lets out a soft laugh. “Why would I be mad? You’re building a life. One that fits. One that makes you happy.” Her voice quiets. “And for what it’s worth . . . I want you to be happy, Callum. That’s all I’ve ever wanted for you.”
I lift my glass. “To new chapters?”
She clinks hers against mine. “To new chapters.”
After dinner, I start rinsing dishes. Jordie disappears down the hall. I’m wiping the counter when she returns, holding a wrapped box and wearing that look—the one that says, “I win.”
“What’s this?” I ask.
“A belated congratulatory-slash-welcome-back gift,” she says, sliding the box toward me with all the grace of someone still angry about it.
I smile. “You’re still mad it took me weeks to tell you.”
“’Course I’m still mad.”
I laugh. “I did tell you, eventually.”
“Three weeks into your trip,” she counters.
“And only after I hinted so many times.” She ticks them off.
“The fake-casual ‘Any exciting work gossip lately?’ The deeply loaded, ‘That gyno project must’ve had an amazing lead.’ I even made you watch the Grey’s Anatomy episode where Bailey gets promoted and says, ‘I didn’t ask. I earned.’”
I laugh, “Okay, yeah. That one landed.”
I dry my hands and take the box. The wrapping crackles. Inside: black scrubs. Pristine. Clean. And then I see it—embroidered over the chest: Callum Han, Associate Director of Anesthetics.
Beneath them is a stack of scrub caps of different colors and patterns, all embroidered as well.
Before I can reach for the final item buried at the bottom, she snaps the lid shut and swaps it for a metal tin that she opens with a magician’s flair. Inside: sugar cookies shaped like laryngoscopes, each one iced with meticulous detail.
I blink. “Jordie, how—?”
“Do you know how hard it is to make laryngoscope-shaped cookies? They don’t sell cutters for that, Callum. I had to free-hand them. At one point, they looked like dicks.”
I’m laughing, this time with my whole body—one of those rare, grounding laughs that reset something in me.
“You didn’t have to go to all this trouble, Jords.”
She waves it off. “You deserve something nice. You’ve been running yourself ragged since I met you.” Her voice softens. “You’re always looking out for everyone else. Maybe I just wanted to look out for you.”
I try to speak. Nothing comes out. Just a breath and a chest that feels impossibly full.
I glance at the clock. “I should probably get going.”
She hands me the tin, then lifts the scrubs and caps and waves them for emphasis. “Don’t forget your gear. Debut as Associate Director in style. Dinosaurs for theater, spaceships for paperwork, and bow-tie dogs for when you need to assert dominance.”
She’s standing there in a flour-dusted shirt, hair wild, eyes bright with pride. And I’ve never seen anyone look more like home.
“Thanks, Jords,” I say, quiet now. “For everything.”
She leans against the doorframe. Her grin fades into something softer. “Good to have you back, Callum.”
The door clicks shut behind me. I stand on her porch, the tin warm in my hands—and my heart even warmer.
I step out of the shower, towel slung around my waist, another working through my damp hair.
I scoop up my clothes from the floor and pad barefoot into the living room to grab the scrubs and caps Jordie gave me for a preload into the wash. As I lift the last cap, something shifts beneath the gold tissue paper.
A slim, clothbound book. Vintage. The spine worn, the pages softly yellowed.
Sonnets from the Portuguese.
There’s only one tab. I flick to it. Sonnet 43.
My eyes drift to her handwriting—small, careful, echoing the sonnet’s tone. On the margins, she’s written a mirror of it:
How do I love thee? Let me show you the ways.
I love thee past the silence, past the haze,
To aching truths I try, and fail, to learn.
I love thee with the part I live without—
The dream I kill to keep from killing you.
I read the rest, and it steals something—steady ground, maybe, or the part of me that thought I’d made peace with her leaving.
So, if I walk away, please know it’s this:
I loved thee more than any life permits.
My hands freeze. The date reads: 28th November.
I blink. That was the night she left.
But she loved me. She loved me while walking out the door.
In a Jordie way—messy, quiet, half-concealed behind sweet gestures and soft exits. In the way she always does things: sideways, protectively, like the truth might bruise more if spoken plainly. She loved me even as she pushed me away. Even when it felt like she didn’t.
And I was hurt. Gutted.
But it must have hurt her more.
To choose the ache over the risk. To believe distance was the most loving thing she could offer.
My thumb brushes the edge of the page. I sit with it. With all of it. The silence. The knowing. The truth we’ve both been too afraid to say.
And then I’m moving.
Shirt. Jeans. Keys. Shoes. Book.
Door.