Chapter 7 #2
My throat burns. There’s pressure behind my eyes—hot, relentless. That old ache I keep buried low starts clawing its way up my chest.
Don’t fall apart. Not here. Not now.
Sophie’s gaze doesn’t waver. There’s no pity in it, just memory—clear and sharp, like it never left her.
“And those nights?” she says, her voice barely holding. “When Mama would scream and slam doors like the whole house was splitting open? When the air felt too thin and I thought if I breathed wrong, it’d all come crashing down?”
I close my eyes. Just for a second. But I can hear it now—her voice, Mama’s, echoing down the hall, the way the walls shook, the way Sophie trembled in my arms.
“You were the one who held me,” she whispers. “You were the one who rocked me like I was made of glass, even when your own hands were shaking. You sang to me, even when your voice was cracking. You told me it was going to be okay, even when we both knew it was a lie.”
I can feel it—the weight of her in my lap, her small fingers gripping my shirt, the way her body fit against mine like she was molded to me, like I was the only safe thing left in the world.
“You held me together, Lou,” she says, and this time it’s not soft—it’s a thunderclap. “When the whole damn world was falling apart…it was always you.”
“You are not a fucking joke, Lou.” Sophie’s voice cracks, thick with emotion, but there’s steel behind it. “Don’t you ever say that again.”
Her hand shakes as she reaches for me, but when our fingers connect, her grip locks tight—like she’s afraid I’ll disappear if she doesn’t hold on. There’s desperation in it, one that makes my ribs ache in places I didn’t know I could feel.
“I’m sorry,” she whispers, her voice splintered and heavy. “I’m so sorry you can’t have children. I’m sorry for that hollow space inside you, for the ache that never lets up. But Lou…” She swallows, her eyes burning into mine. “You’ve been one hell of a mama to me.”
Something inside me lurches. Like she reached in and knocked the wind out of my soul.
Her stare doesn’t flinch. There’s no room for argument in it—just a kind of fierce, furious love that demands to be believed.
“I know it feels like life took everything from us,” she says, voice raw and trembling. “But because of you, we had something left to hold onto. You made sure I had a life. You gave me light when there wasn’t any. You held us together when everything else was burning down around us.”
She steps closer, her hand tightening like a tether pulling me back from the edge.
“And not once—not once—has anyone in this family pitied you. Not because of what you can’t do.
Not because of what was stolen from you.
We love you exactly as you are. We see you, Lou.
All the fire, all the flaws. You’re the pain in our asses we’d go to war for.
Nothing could ever change that.” She pauses.
Then, quieter—but not softer—she says, “Not for us…and not for him.”
Him. That word. It always lands like shrapnel.
Henry Wilder.
The reason this grief keeps blooming like a bruise that never fades. The reason I wake up some mornings, already aching.
He deserves more than what I can give. He deserves a son with his wild grin and stubborn streak.
A little boy with thick, sandy blonde hair and a heart too big for his chest. He deserves to pass on the best parts of himself, to teach someone how to throw a ball, how to be gentle in a cruel world, how to hold love like it’s sacred.
But I can’t give him that.
Not the way he deserves. Not the way that fills that quiet emptiness behind his eyes when he watches other men with their children.
I saw it in the way he held Bash’s sleeping body, in the way he danced with me like the world had stopped spinning. The way he knew just how to cradle that tiny boy without being told.
He would be the kind of father who pours himself out. Who builds forts and reads bedtime stories and keeps monsters at bay. The kind of father he never got the chance to have. The kind I can never help him become.
The truth is…It’s easier to hate him than to watch him live with what he’s missing. Easier to push him away than wonder if he stays out of guilt. Easier to be angry than admit I feel like a consolation prize.
So I build my walls. I let the bitterness simmer, because it gives me something to hold onto. Something solid. Something sharp. It’s easier than facing the truth. That I love him so much it fucking hurts, but I’ll never be enough.
But Sophie knows. She always has.
So instead of speaking it aloud, I do the only thing I can. I pull her in and wrap my arms around her, burying my face in her shoulder. “Damn, bitch,” I murmur, voice thick, “when’d you get so good with words?”
She lets out a watery laugh, her body melting into mine. “Someone had to figure out how to make sense of all this mess. Look at our family.”
She tucks her head into the crook of my neck, and we stand like that—quiet, breathing, full of everything that doesn’t need to be said out loud.
I pull back after a minute and swipe at the corner of her face with the bottom of my T-shirt, smearing a bit of powdered sugar in the process.
“I love you, Soph,” I say, voice steadier now.
She grins, sniffling. “I love you too. Now help me finish that strawberry custard you stole last night thinking I wouldn’t notice.”
I raise a brow. “You always notice. It’s like you’ve got sugar radar.”
She nudges me with her elbow. “That’s because if I didn’t, you’d eat the whole damn batch and leave me with an empty bowl and your bullshit excuses.”
I laugh as we turn back to the counter. “That happened once, and you’ve never let it go.”
“Oh no, ma’am. That happens all the damn time.”