Chapter 29
TWENTY-NINE
TORI
The office is blissfully quiet for a late morning. The heater rattles to life, pushing warmth into the corners, and the faint smell of burnt coffee drifts down the hall from the faculty lounge.
I’m halfway through an email to a panicked student begging to swap into a calculus section that’s already three seats past capacity when a voice I haven’t heard in months cuts through the air.
“Hey, Tori.”
My fingers still on the keyboard. For a split second, I think I’ve imagined it. But when I look up, there he is.
Chase.
Standing just inside the doorway like he belongs here, but not quite. His hands shoved into the pockets of his jacket, his shoulders set, his eyes—calm.
Not cold, not furious, not the sharp edge I braced myself for the last time he showed up. Just… calm.
“Hello,” I say, my voice even. Not defensive. A little wary, but not brittle.
I promised myself I wouldn’t let him shake me anymore.
“How are you?” he asks.
I blink. Not the script I expected.
No accusations. No demands.
Just words that sound simple, ordinary, almost too plain to come from his mouth.
My guard goes up anyway. He’s never led with “how are you” in his life.
“I’m… fine, thank you. Can I help you with something?”
He shifts on his feet, glances at the empty chair across from my desk. Nervous. Nervous?
I can’t remember the last time I saw Chase look anything but sure of himself, cocky, or angry.
This is new. Or maybe it’s an act.
Maybe he’s calculating how long it will take Leo to step out of his office and haul him out by the collar if he raises his voice.
Too bad Leo is across campus teaching a class right now.
However, Chase doesn’t know that.
“I was wondering if we could talk?” he asks.
I study him. Wait a few seconds to see if his face betrays the performance.
But there’s nothing. No twitch of impatience, no simmering frustration under the surface.
Just sincerity. Or something that looks an awful lot like it.
“Give me just a minute,” I say, my voice steady. “Then I can take my lunch break. We can go somewhere to talk, okay?”
Relief flickers across his face, softening his jaw. “That sounds great. Um… do you want me to wait outside, or…?”
I glance toward the chair in front of my desk, the one students use when they need me to sort out their schedules. Neutral ground.
“You can sit there. I’ll just be a minute.”
He nods and walks the few steps forward, dropping into the chair before letting his eyes roam the office like he needs something to focus on.
He doesn’t stare at me, which I appreciate.
The silence stretches, but not in the old way—the tense, buzzing way that used to make me fill it with nervous chatter. This silence just exists, and I let it.
I finish my email, close the laptop, and slip into my coat. It’s early for lunch, barely past eleven, but I don’t care. I grab my purse and gesture toward the door. “Does pizza work for you?”
His mouth curves into the faintest smile. “Sounds good.”
Outside, February air slaps against my cheeks, sharp and wet with the promise of snow. The quad is full of students hustling between classes, collars pulled up, scarves covering their mouths.
Chase walks beside me but not close enough to brush my arm, and for that, I’m grateful. We pass the student center, the library, and then step into the warmth of Nico’s.
Garlic and dough and melted cheese wrap around us like a blanket. It’s cozy, crowded, every table buzzing with students and professors trying to steal warmth from both food and each other.
We place our orders at the kiosk. Chase pays. I don’t argue, just murmur thanks, and lead us to a two-person table tucked against the side wall near the back. It’s the kind of spot where I can see the whole room, mainly, the entrance.
Leo’s class doesn’t let out until 11:20, so I didn’t bother scanning the room when we entered.
But if he walks through that front door, I want to know it.
Chase sits across from me, his elbows on the table, eyes searching mine for a beat too long.
Then he says, “You look good.”
I huff out a soft laugh, not unkind.
“Thanks. You look… tired.”
Because he does. Dark circles under his eyes. Shoulders drawn tight.
He’s always carried a certain recklessness about him, but today it looks heavier, like it’s wearing him down.
He runs a hand through his sandy hair, chuckling quietly.
“Yeah, well. These last few months have been kinda rough.”
I nod. I don’t offer more. I’m not here to make this easy for him.
Silence again. I let it sit.
He clears his throat.
“I’ve been going to therapy.”
“I heard,” I say simply. He doesn’t ask how.
I don’t tell him about the disgusting phone call I received from my father the same day he called to cuss me out.
My nod is enough. I’m done carrying his words for him.
“I’m… I’m sorry, Tori,” he says.
A blank stare from me. “For what?”
“Everything,” he says. His voice cracks.
“All of it.”
I shake my head, half laugh, half disbelief.
How many times have I wanted to hear those words? And how hollow do they sound now, echoing back after all this time?
“I’m serious, okay?” He leans forward, urgency creeping into his tone.
“I’m sorry. I’ve been an asshole. I’ve been selfish. I haven’t touched a drop of alcohol since October—”
“Bullshit,” I snap.
“I’m serious.” His hands flatten on the table.
“That’s when I started therapy. Real therapy. Not that ‘pray harder, read your Bible more’ crap at church. An actual therapist who knows what they’re talking about.”
That makes me look up. That catches my attention.
I don’t bring up the fact that I spent years begging him to go. Literal years trying to explain how badly he needed professional help.
He rushes on. “I knew that if I just said it, you wouldn’t believe me. And you’d never come home. I had to show you I was serious. And I am serious. About this. About us.”
A waiter delivers our food to the table.
“Enjoy.”
Then he’s gone, and Chase doesn’t even glance at the pizza. He keeps his eyes locked on me, like if he blinks I’ll vanish.
“I’ve been going every week since the beginning of October,” he says. “And I haven’t touched alcohol—I swear I haven’t. Not even when you had those fucking divorce papers served.”
His hand curls into a fist on the table.
I brace myself for the eruption, the old familiar shouting match. But it doesn’t come.
He inhales sharply, unclenches, and exhales.
Different. Almost unrecognizable.
“I shouldn’t have yelled at you,” he says.
“No, you shouldn’t have.”
“But you shouldn’t have served me divorce papers without talking to me first.”
I scoff. “I tried, Chase.”
“When?” His voice lifts, but only slightly. Enough to sting, not enough to draw eyes from the tables around us.
“I’ve been trying to talk to you for years. You never listened. So I left. And I told you—first in the letter I left when I moved out, and then again to your face when you showed up here—that I was done.”
His mouth presses tight, and then he exhales.
“I’m listening now.”
I tilt my head, studying him.
“Are you, though?”
He swallows, and for a long moment he doesn’t speak.
Then, softer, “Look, Tori.”
His hand reaches across the table, covering mine.
Warm. Familiar. Heavy.
I don’t pull away, but I don’t lace my fingers with his either. I let it sit, let the weight of it press into my skin without pressing back.
“I’m sorry,” he says again, voice earnest.
“I’m so fucking sorry. And I love you. I’ve always loved you. I haven’t stopped therapy, and I won’t. I’ll keep going. We can go together, if you want. We can figure this out. If you’d just come home, we can fix this. Fix us. We can make it better this time.”
I stare at our joined hands.
And I feel… nothing.
No spark. No ache. No pull toward the boy I once swore was my forever.
He’s saying all the things I begged him for, year after year, but every word spoken is too little, too late. The emptiness between us is louder than his voice.
“If you’d just come home,” he pleads. “We can fix this. Together.”
My lips part, the words leaving before I can second-guess them.
“I’ll go back with you.”
Shock flickers across his face. He wasn’t expecting that.
Relief floods in after, softening him in a way I haven’t seen in years. His smile is small, genuine, unguarded.
Gratitude. Victory, maybe, but not smugness. Just thankfulness.
“You… you will?” he asks.
I nod once.
His smile spreads, full and bright. He looks like a man who just won back the world.
Chase doesn’t notice that I’m quiet for the rest of lunch. Doesn’t notice how I chew my pizza in silence, how my eyes drift to the window instead of him.
He fills the space with stories of Moraine, work, friends, all the pieces of his life I’ve been absent for.
He doesn’t ask about mine. Not once.
In his mind, this is already settled. We’re already back where we belong.
By the time we finish eating, he’s talking about a second honeymoon.
Maybe tropical. Maybe Europe. Maybe both.
He’s already spinning the future, building castles out of words, and I let him. I smile in the right places, let him talk until he’s full of himself again.
When it’s time to leave, I stand, slipping my arms back into my coat.
“You head home,” I tell him. “I’ve got to grab a few things, but I’ll meet you at the house around dinnertime.”
His grin is soft, boyish. “Okay. See you tonight.”
He leans in, places a soft kiss on my cheek, then turns and leaves.
And just like that, he’s gone.
Out the door, into the cold, convinced he’s won me back.