Chapter 30 ASH
ASH
Gone
The city hums beneath my feet as I run, pushing harder, faster, like I can outrun the weight lodged in my chest.
The slap of my sneakers against pavement. The heat in my lungs. The sweat dripping down my spine. It’s all noise and movement and rhythm—something I can control. Something that doesn’t ask for anything back.
Unlike her.
I take the long loop through the hills, past palm trees and stucco mansions, earbuds in but nothing playing. My thoughts are louder than anything music could drown out anyway.
She said she loved me.
And I didn’t say a damn thing.
Because it wasn’t supposed to happen. That’s what I tell myself.
We had a deal. A clear one. I chose someone safe. Simple. Someone who wouldn’t fall for me. That was the whole point.
And Olive—God, Olive with her messy buns and nervous laughs and heart too big for her body—she was never supposed to matter like that.
Except she did.
She does.
No. Don’t go there. I shake my head hard and speed up, my calves burning as I hit the last stretch toward my building. It’s better this way. She knew the deal. She’ll bounce back. She always does.
And me? I’ll go inside, shower, eat something, and we’ll reset. Back to just faking it. No feelings. No fooling around.
Clean. Controlled.
God, I’ll miss her.
When I step inside, the house is quiet.
“Olive?” I call.
Silence. No answer.
She probably needs some privacy right now—holed up in her room reading, writing, or talking to Nina. The least I can do is give it to her.
I shower for the second time today, eat lunch, and check my inbox. Try to answer a few emails before getting frustrated and closing my laptop again. I wander through the house like a guy pretending he has better things to do than knock on a door and say, Hey. Can we talk?
Eventually I head to the studio. It’s the one place that usually works as a distraction. The familiar weight of the guitar in my hands, the quiet hum of the amp warming up, the feel of sound vibrating through my chest—it usually resets me.
Not today.
Every chord I play leads me back to her.
To the way she looked at me. The way she said I love you—like she couldn’t keep it in.
To the silence I gave her in return.
I try switching to something louder, heavier. Something with bite. But my fingers don’t cooperate, and my thoughts keep drifting. Her laugh, her tiny annoyed huffs when she loses her page, the sound of her slippers padding around the house—all of it fills the silence like a ghost.
I last maybe an hour before I give up.
She’s still not out.
No sound. No movement. No creak of a floorboard. I wait a little longer. Tell myself she’s probably just sleeping. Or journaling. Or whatever it is people do when they’ve just been emotionally gut-punched by someone they trusted.
But as the sun shifts lower in the sky, something starts to twist in my gut.
This isn’t space.
This is silence.
And something about it feels off.
I head down the hall, heart knocking a little harder than I want to admit, and stop outside her door.
I knock once. Quietly.
“Olive?”
No answer.
I wait a beat, then another. Nothing.
Weird.
I turn the knob and ease the door open.
The room hits me like a slap. What used to be all cheerful colors and fuzzy blankets is now stripped down to quiet minimalism.
No fuzzy blanket on the armchair. No stack of worn paperbacks with cracked spines and pastel covers. No fox slippers. No hoodie she stole from me and smugly claimed as her own.
My pulse stutters.
I step toward the closet. It is empty.
Nothing.
Not a single trace of her.
Gone.
I stand there, trying to process it, trying to make it make sense—but my brain just echoes in one word: gone.
A sharp breath leaves me, ragged and uneven, like I just took a punch to the ribs.
I walk quickly to the bathroom next, pulling back the vanity drawer.
Empty.
No toothbrush. No moisturizer she made me try and then laughed when I said it “felt like pudding.” No bobby pins scattered like confetti across the counter.
I turn in a slow, stunned circle like maybe I missed something. Like maybe she’s hiding behind the door, or under the sink, or anywhere.
But the silence isn’t just quiet. It’s hollow.
I step back out into the hallway. Into the living room.
Her tote bag isn’t by the door.
Her sandals are gone from the mat.
I scan the room again, hoping—what, exactly? That I hallucinated the emptiness? That maybe she just moved things around?
But I know better.
She didn’t move things.
She took them.
She packed her stuff. Her books. Her clothes. Her pillow, her shoes, her laugh, her presence—all of it.
She didn’t just leave the room.
She left me.
I feel something dangerous settling in the pit of my stomach.
Not anger.
Not panic.
But something close.
Regret.
And the awful, creeping suspicion that I just made the biggest mistake of my life.
I pace the living room, then snatch up my phone from the coffee table.
No texts.
No calls.
Nothing.
I open our thread and type out a message.
Ash:
Olive. Just tell me you’re okay.
Send.
Another.
Ash:
Please.
Send.
Then I call her.
It rings. And rings. And rings.
No answer.
Straight to voicemail. God, I want a drink right now.
I hang up and try again. The same.
I text her again.
Ash:
Can we talk? I didn’t mean—
Delete. Re-type.
Ash:
I’m sorry. Can we talk?
Send.
Still nothing.
I rake a hand through my hair, the panic starting to build like a pressure valve inside my chest. I can’t sit still. I can’t think. My heart is thudding like I’m back onstage under too-hot lights and the lyrics won’t come.
Where the hell would she go?
I try to think, try to be rational, but every instinct in my body points to the same place.
Liam.
She probably went to Liam’s. It makes sense. She lived there before. She probably still has a key. And yeah, they had that fight, but he’s still her brother. He’d take her in. Keep her safe. Keep her away from me.
When I finally pull up in front of his building, I’m practically vibrating with tension.
I park half-crooked and don’t bother locking the car.
I take the stairs two at a time, past faded door numbers and the smell of someone's takeout. Third floor. Apartment 3B. The one with the scuffed welcome mat and a crooked peephole.
I don’t hesitate.
I bang on the door, loud and hard, like I’m picking a fight.
Because maybe I am.
There’s a pause—long enough for my heart to hammer up into my throat.
Then the door swings open.
Liam’s standing there in a T-shirt and joggers, barefoot, and very obviously still pissed. His expression doesn’t change when he sees me. If anything, his jaw tightens.
“Wow,” he says flatly. “Brave of you to show up.”
I don’t waste time. “Is she here?”
His eyes narrow. “What?”
“Olive. Is she here?”
He crosses his arms. “Why the hell would she be here?”
“Because she’s not at my place. She’s gone. Packed up. Took everything. I thought maybe—” I stop, exhale hard. “I figured she might come to you.”
Liam lets out a sharp, bitter laugh. “So you did it. Just like I said you would—you broke her heart. And now you think you can just waltz back in here and expect her to talk to you? You really think that’s how this works?”
“I don’t know how any of this works!” I snap, louder than I mean to. “All I know is she’s gone and not answering her phone, and I thought—hoped—she’d be with you.”
He shakes his head slowly. “You really don’t get it, do you?”
I grind my teeth. “Get what?”
“That this is exactly why you should’ve stayed the hell away from her.” His voice is low now, dangerous. “This right here. You play your games, keep your distance—and then what? You let her fall for you and shut down the second it gets real? You don’t get to be surprised when she leaves, man.”
I don’t respond. Because I did let her fall. And I didn’t catch her.
“You think I wanted you two together?” he goes on, arms tightening across his chest. “I knew how this would end. That it would blow up and she’d be the one left bleeding.”
“And yet,” I say through gritted teeth, “I’m the one standing here trying to find her.”
Liam gives me a long look. It’s not pity. It’s not anger. It’s something worse—disappointment.
“Then maybe you should’ve thought about that before you went and fucked everything up.”
I run a hand over my face, the frustration boiling over into my veins. “I’m not here to argue with you, Liam. I just need to know if she’s safe.”
He studies me for a long moment. Then, finally, sighs.
“She’s not here,” he says. “I haven’t seen her.”
My stomach drops.
“I’ll make sure she is okay,” he adds reluctantly. “But that doesn’t mean I forgive you.”
I blink. “That’s okay. Thank you.”
His jaw tightens. “She’s my sister.”
Right. Of course.
I step back.“Just… let her know I’m looking. That I care.”
Liam gives me a look. Not angry. Not soft, either. Just tired.
“Then maybe start acting like it,” he says, and shuts the door.