Chapter 42
Grayson
I cried when I got home.
I barely made it through the drive home. I was so out of it that I ran a red light, stopped halfway through the intersection as I slammed on my brakes, then realized it was safer to carry on.
I managed to get all the way to my bed before I broke.
It was quiet, obviously, because my daughter was asleep down the hall. But it was bad because Carly is not.
This morning, my eyes feel gritty and swollen.
My chest feels hollowed out, like someone reached inside me with both hands and scooped out whatever used to keep me upright.
I barely slept. When I did, I dreamed about the bell over the cafe door, about the cold air rushing in, about Carly stepping back from me like it was dangerous to not.
But for the first time in weeks, I swim.
The pool is cold enough to make my body lock up for the first lap. I haven't bothered turning on the heating for it in weeks. But again and again, I cut through the water until my arms burn and my lungs ache, until my brain finally goes quiet for more than two consecutive seconds.
It doesn’t fix anything.
After, I shower, shave, put on actual clothes instead of the same sweatpants I’ve been haunting this house in for weeks.
I sit at the kitchen table, staring into a cup of coffee I made ten minutes ago but haven’t touched.
The house is still. Morning light spills pale and gold across the counters, catching on the stainless steel, the glass doors, the little pink cup Penelope left upside down by the sink last night. Everything looks too disgustingly normal for the way I feel.
I hear her before I see her.
Soft footsteps, a sleepy little shuffle. When I look up, Penelope is standing in the kitchen doorway wearing her unicorn pajamas, hair mashed on one side, Daddy Bear clutched under her arm by his neck like he, too, had a long night.
Her eyes are barely open. “Daddy?”
“Morning, bug,” I say, and my voice sounds so raw that she notices.
She frowns at me, instantly a little more awake. “Are you sick?”
“No.” I try to smile. It doesn’t land. “Come here.”
She crosses the kitchen without hesitation and climbs into my lap with the boneless determination of a child who has never once considered whether she is digging a kneecap or elbow into me. Daddy Bear gets wedged between my ribs and her chest. She smells like peanut butter and strawberry shampoo.
I wrap both arms around her and drop my face to her hair.
For a second, I have to close my eyes.
“Daddy?” she mumbles against my shirt.
“Yeah?”
“What happened with Carly?”
The question hits exactly where I have no armor left. I hold her a little tighter, careful not to squeeze too hard. “We talked yesterday.”
She pulls back enough to look at me. “Did you fix it?”
My throat closes.
Four words, as simple as a crayon drawing, as devastating as a gavel.
I look down at her small face, at the worry already gathering between her brows, and I hate myself more than I’ve ever hated anyone.
“No,” I say quietly. “No, baby. I didn’t.”
Her mouth turns down. “Why not?”
I breathe out slowly through my nose.
Because I hurt her.
Because I was so scared of being made a fool of that I made one of myself instead.
Because when she walked away, I froze.
Because I still don’t know how to love someone without flinching first.
I can’t say all of that to a four-year-old, so I smooth my hand over her hair and give her the truest version that will fit in her little hands.
“I hurt her feelings,” I say. “Really badly. And I said things that made her feel like I didn’t trust her.”
Penelope blinks at me. “But Carly is nice.”
“I know.”
“She makes good mac and cheese.”
“She does.”
“So why did you hurt her feelings?”
“I got scared,” I say, trying desperately to keep myself together for her.
Penelope’s frown deepens. “Of Carly?”
“No. Not of her.” I swallow, my eyes burning again. “Of losing her, I think. And then I made it happen anyway.”
She watches me carefully, like she is trying very hard to understand grown-up stupidity.
I kiss the top of her head because I can’t stand the look on her face, keeping my head pressed to hers. “I’m sorry, bug.”
“For what?”
“For failing.” The word breaks on the way out.
Penelope goes very still in my lap. I stare over her head at the cooling cup of coffee, jaw tight, eyes fixed hard because if I look at her, I might start crying again and I don’t want that fear in her memory.
I don’t want her to remember her father falling apart at the kitchen table because he couldn’t keep the best woman he’d ever known.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper again. “I tried to fix it, and I failed.”
Her small hand tries to pat my cheek, but it feels a bit more like a slap. “You can’t give up,” she says.
I blink.
She says it like it’s obvious, like I’ve told her we’re out of bananas and she’s explaining that the store exists.
“What?”
“You can’t give up,” she repeats, more firmly this time. “You have to try again. That’s what we’re supposed to do, right?”
I stare down at her.
Her eyes are serious now. Sleepy, but serious. Daddy Bear is crushed between us, his stitched little smile warped against my shirt.
“Pen—”
“Do you love her?”
The question steals every bit of oxygen from the room.
I haven’t told Penelope what Carly was to me, not really. I didn’t give it a name, didn’t fold her into what was happening in case it all went south, but it’s affected her anyway.
My throat works once, twice.
Penelope waits.
There is no judgment in her little face, no manipulation, no strategy. Just the honest expectation that adults should know what they feel and say it.
“Yes,” I say, but it comes out broken.
Her eyes widen slightly.
I pull in a breath, but it shakes. “Yes, baby. I love her.”
I love her.
I love her.
I love her laugh, her mouth, her stubborn chin, her soft heart.
I love the way she sketches when she thinks no one is watching and the way she argues football calls with more passion than most retired players I know.
I love the way she kneels to talk to my daughter at eye level.
I love the way she made this house feel like a home I wanted to come back to.
I love her, and I let her leave.
Penelope nods, apparently satisfied with my answer, wholly oblivious to the wreckage it left. “Then you have to try more.”
I let out a long, slow breath. “Try more?”
“Uh-huh.” She shifts in my lap, warming to her own plan. “You bring her things.”
“Things…?”
“Like chocolates,” she says. “Or flowers. Mommy likes flowers sometimes.”
I manage not to react to that comparison. She’s four and she means well.
“Okay.”
“Or pretty things,” she adds, nodding gravely. “Girls like pretty things.”
I arch a brow despite myself. “And then what?”
“Then you say sorry again.”
“I did say sorry, bug.”
She gives me a look so unimpressed it could have come from Dana. “Then say it more.”
God help me, a real laugh punches out of my chest this time. It hurts, but it’s real.
Penelope smiles a little, clearly encouraged. “And keep doing it until she wants you back.”
It’s so simple, so naive, the kind of advice only a little girl with a stuffed bear under her arm could give, because she doesn’t yet know that life is far more complicated than apologizing over and over.
Except… maybe she’s right. Maybe it is simple.
I’ve fought for contracts, for championships, for Cole's sobriety when he couldn’t fight for himself, for custody, for my daughter’s stability, for every piece of this life I built out of discipline and stubbornness and refusal.
I have never fought for love. Not like this. But I think I might know how.
I look down at Penelope, at her hopeful little face, and something inside me shifts.
“All right,” I say, my voice still rough, but steadier now. “Go get dressed.”
Her eyes brighten. “Why?”
“Because we’re going to have breakfast, and then we’re going out.”
“Where?”
I reach for my phone on the table and open my texts with Cole, my thumb hovering for a second.
Hey man, I need a favor.
I send it before I can overthink it.
Penelope cranes her neck, trying to see the screen. “Are we going to Uncle Cole’s?”
“Nope.”
Her face falls, but I tap her nose gently.
“We’re going shopping.”
Her nose scrunches but she scrambles off me anyway. “For what? Groceries?”
“No,” I answer. “Something pretty.”