Chapter 44 Logan
LOGAN
Looking from the outside, nothing about this house announces what happened inside. Nothing about it tells the truth—that grief moved in and made itself comfortable, that it sits on the couch and eats the air and doesn’t pay rent.
I park at the curb and cut the engine.
The silence hits first.
Not the peaceful kind. The kind that makes you realize how loud a room can be even when nobody is talking. The kind that makes you aware of every single thing your brain is carrying because there’s nothing else to listen to.
My phone is on the passenger seat.
Face down. Like that changes anything.
I don’t touch it. I don’t check it. I don’t even want to look at it, because I already know what I’ll see again.
Chicago.
One missed call that feels like a door cracking open at the worst possible time.
I sit there with both hands on the wheel, staring at the front window like I can see through it. Like I can spot Sloane in her usual place—curled into the couch, eyes open but not really awake, pretending the TV is saying something she understands.
I swallow hard.
I can handle pain. I can handle rehab. I can handle the kind of suffering you can count in reps and seconds and progress charts.
But this?
This is the kind of pain that doesn’t want to be solved. It just wants to exist.
And Sloane has been existing in it since the day Pops died.
I force myself out of the truck, shut the door softly, and walk up the steps like I’m entering a place I don’t deserve.
Because even now—even after everything—some part of me still worries I’m imposing.
Still worries that this family will finally look at me and decide they’re tired of holding space for Logan Brooks.
I push the door open quietly.
The living room lamp is on.
The TV is on low.
And on the couch, Sloane is exactly where I pictured her—wrapped in a blanket like it’s the only thing keeping her in one piece.
But she’s not alone.
Jade and Blakely are sitting with her.
Jade’s hair is up in a messy bun, cheeks flushed like she came straight from practice or a run she didn’t need. Blakely’s perched sideways on the couch, legs tucked under her, a bowl of popcorn in her lap that looks untouched.
They both look up when I step in.
Jade’s expression softens immediately. Like she’s been waiting for me to walk through the door.
Blakely gives me a small nod—serious, for once.
“Hey,” I say quietly.
Sloane’s head turns. Slow. Heavy.
Her eyes land on me, and something in my chest twists because she doesn’t brighten—not really—but she…anchors. Like seeing me reminds her where she is.
“Hey,” she whispers.
Her voice is thin. Like she hasn’t used it for anything except survival.
I cross the room and crouch in front of the couch so I’m not towering over her.
Her face is pale in the soft light, lashes darker against her cheeks, lips slightly chapped.
She’s wearing another one of Pops’s old sweatshirts—the navy one with the faded lettering—and it hits me like a fist because that’s not a coincidence.
That’s a choice.
A way of pretending he’s still here.
“You okay?” I ask, already knowing the answer.
Sloane’s mouth twitches like she might try to joke but doesn’t make it.
“No.”
At least she’s honest.
Jade clears her throat behind me, the kind of sound that says we’re leaving, but we don’t want to make it weird.
“We were just—” she starts.
“Keeping her company,” Blakely finishes.
Sloane doesn’t react. She keeps staring at me like it takes effort to focus.
Jade leans forward, resting her elbows on her knees. “She ate half a piece of toast.”
“Which is,” Blakely adds, “a win, considering she looked like she wanted to fight the toaster.”
Sloane’s eyes flick to them, deadpan. “It deserved it.”
Jade snorts softly, like relief. Like she’s grateful for even that tiny flicker of Sloane’s personality.
Then she stands and grabs her jacket from the chair. “We’re gonna head out. We said we’d stop by Becca’s for her birthday thing.”
Blakely points a finger at me as she rises. “You text if you need anything.”
I nod once. “I will.”
Jade squeezes Sloane’s shoulder gently. “We’ll come back tomorrow, okay?”
Sloane gives a small nod, eyes on the blanket.
“Night, Slo,” Blakely says, softer than usual.
“Night,” Sloane murmurs.
They walk toward the door, but Jade pauses beside me.
Her voice drops, quiet enough that Sloane won’t hear. “She hasn’t showered.”
My stomach tightens.
Blakely’s gaze meets mine—serious, protective. “She keeps saying she will, and then she just…doesn’t.”
I nod once. “I’ve got it.”
Jade hesitates, then says, like she’s choosing her words carefully, “She lets you in more than anyone right now.”
The weight of that lands hard.
Because it’s not a compliment.
It’s a responsibility.
They leave quietly, the front door clicking shut behind them.
The house exhales.
Sloane doesn’t move.
She’s still staring at the TV, but her eyes are glassy, unfocused, like she’s trying to leave her body without actually dying.
I sit on the edge of the coffee table, close but not crowding.
“Do you want the TV off?” I ask.
Sloane’s eyes blink slowly. “Doesn’t matter.”
I reach for the remote anyway and mute it. The sudden absence of sound makes the room feel larger—emptier—like we can hear the grief moving around inside the walls.
Sloane swallows.
Her throat works like it’s painful.
“I hate this,” she whispers.
I don’t ask what she means.
Because it’s everything.
The house. The quiet. The after. The way people leave and life keeps moving even when hers doesn’t.
I keep my voice steady. “I know.”
A beat passes.
Then I ask, still gentle, “Can we take a shower?”
Sloane’s shoulders stiffen instantly, like she heard the word and felt attacked by it.
“I’m fine.”
“Okay,” I say softly. “But I’m gonna be honest—you don’t look fine.”
Her eyes flash to me, sharp for the first time in hours. “Wow. Thank you. That helps.”
There it is. The bite. The familiar edge that says she’s still in there somewhere.
I let my mouth twitch. “Anytime.”
Sloane stares at me like she wants to be angry, but she’s too tired to hold it.
“I don’t want to,” she admits, voice cracking on the last word.
My chest aches.
“I know.” I keep my tone low. “But it might make you feel…one percent less like you’re crawling out of your own skin.”
She swallows hard again.
Then, barely, she nods.
I stand and offer my hand.
Sloane hesitates like she’s deciding whether she can accept help without breaking.
Then she takes it. Her fingers are cold when they meet mine.
I pull her up slowly, careful, and she sways for a second before she catches herself. I don’t let go.
We move down the hallway at her pace—slow, quiet, the house creaking under our steps like it’s listening.
In the bathroom, I turn on the shower and adjust it until the steam starts to rise. I grab a towel. Another one. I set her shampoo and conditioner on the ledge and take my shirt off.
Sloane stands in the doorway, arms crossed tight over her chest, eyes fixed on nothing.
“You don’t have to—” she starts.
“I do,” I say gently. “Let me do this.”
Her eyes flick to mine.
For a second, she looks like she’s going to argue.
Then her face crumples just slightly, so fast it almost doesn’t happen, and she nods once. She carefully takes off her clothes, leaving them in a pile next to the vanity.
She steps in.
The water hits her shoulders, and she flinches like it hurts, then exhales like her body finally remembered what warmth feels like.
I stay just outside the curtain, close enough that she doesn’t feel alone, far enough that she doesn’t feel watched.
Minutes pass; the steam thickens.
Then her voice comes, small and raw.
“Logan?”
I swallow. “Yeah?”
A pause.
Then, barely above a whisper, “Thank you.”
Something inside me cracks open. Not in a dramatic way.
In the quiet way grief breaks you, slow yet inevitable, without asking permission.
I pull the curtain carefully, stepping closer to the water, trying not to make a huge mess all over the bathroom floor. My pants are getting soaked, but I don’t care. This is about her and what she needs right now, not about me.
I pour shampoo into my palm and work it into her scalp, slow circles, not rushing, not trying to fix anything—just doing the one thing I can do.
Sloane’s head tips backward automatically.
Her shoulders drop a fraction.
And when her breathing catches, when a small, broken sound slips out of her like she didn’t mean to make it, I keep my hands steady.
“I’ve got you,” I whisper, close to her ear. “I’m right here.”
She doesn’t answer.
She just leans back slightly, letting my chest support her for one second.
And in that second, I realize something terrifying:
If she lets me hold her like this, even for a moment—
I might never be able to let her go.
Sloane stays under the water like she’s trying to let it rinse the last two weeks off her skin.
Like the hot water can wash grief down the drain if she just stands there long enough.
I keep my hands slow in her hair, careful fingers working the shampoo through the roots, massaging her scalp the way Pops used to do when she was little and had a headache—she told me that once, years ago, like it was nothing. Like it didn’t mean everything.
But I remember.
The steam wraps around us, turning the bathroom into its own small world. A world where there’s no gravesite. No casseroles in disposable pans. No people saying he’s in a better place, like that makes the place he left any easier to live in.
She makes a tiny sound, caught in her throat, and her shoulders start to tremble.
I don’t stop. I don’t ask her to talk.
I just keep going, because giving her exactly what she needs feels like the closest thing to prayer I’ve ever understood.
When the shampoo’s rinsed, I squeeze the conditioner into my palm.
“Okay?” I murmur, close to her ear.
Sloane nods once.
That’s all she’s been able to manage lately. Nods. Small words. Tiny permissions.