Chapter 29
Chase's POV
He watched Emily leave through the front door carrying what remained of their life together in two suitcases and a purse slung over her shoulder.
And somehow that felt worse than screaming would have.
There had been no explosion.
No hatred.
No slammed doors.
Parker walked her to the car while Aria who had disappeared somewhere outside when they arrived, was still nowhere to be seen she was still giving everyone space to survive the moment however they needed to.
Chase stayed behind in the living room for a few seconds after the door shut.
Alone.
The house suddenly feeling too still around him.
His chest hurt.
Not the sharp kind of hurt.
Not panic.
Not confusion.
Just sadness.
Because despite everything, despite the truth of where his heart belonged, Emily had loved him.
And he had loved her too.
Maybe not forever.
Maybe not in the soul deep way he loved Aria.
But enough that losing her still felt like tearing something apart with his bare hands.
He rubbed both hands down his face slowly, exhaling hard before finally forcing himself toward the front window.
Outside, Parker was helping Emily load the last of her bags into the backseat of the car.
Even from here, Chase could see how hard she was trying to hold herself together.
That twisted something ugly inside him.
Because he hated that he had become another tragedy in someone else's life.
Emily looked up once before getting into the car.
Their eyes met through the glass.
And for a second...
Everything inside him wanted to walk outside and apologize again.
For not being enough.
For changing.
But apologies did not fix this.
They would not make right the wrongs.
They never would.
Emily gave him the smallest smile.
Sad.
Soft.
Then she climbed into the car and shut the door.
A moment later, the headlights disappeared down the driveway.
Gone.
Just like that.
Chase stood there staring at the empty drive long after the car vanished.
The silence afterward felt strange.
Like the world itself had paused to catch its breath.
Eventually, he turned away from the window and headed for the back door.
He did not know exactly what he was looking for.
Only that his chest felt too full to stay inside.
The night air hit him softly as he stepped onto the deck.
The sky stretched endlessly above him, black and scattered with stars.
And there...
At the edge of the railing...
Stood Aria.
Alone.
Her hair moved gently in the breeze, loose around her shoulders, the porch light catching pieces of it like threads of gold and brown woven together.
She was looking upward.
Toward the stars.
Toward something bigger than both of them.
And suddenly...
Chase understood something that nearly brought him to his knees.
She had always been above him.
Not better than him.
Never that.
But brighter.
Softer.
Stronger in ways he never fully appreciated when he was younger.
Aria loved with her whole soul.
Without hesitation.
Without conditions.
Even now.
Even after he forgot her.
Even after he came back broken in ways neither of them fully understood.
And standing there watching her beneath the night sky, Chase realized something terrifyingly simple.
She was the reason he survived.
Not consciously.
Not logically.
But somewhere deep inside the shattered pieces of himself, he had been trying to get back to her the entire time.
Like a compass still pointing home even after being thrown into darkness.
Aria must have sensed him because she glanced back over her shoulder slightly.
"You okay?"
Such a simple question.
And he honestly did not know how to answer it anymore.
"No," he admitted quietly.
That earned him the faintest sad smile from her before she looked back up at the sky.
"Yeah," she murmured. "Me neither."
He stepped beside her slowly, resting his forearms against the railing.
For a while, neither of them spoke.
"I saw her off," he said eventually.
Aria nodded once.
"I know."
A pause.
"She's going home to her family."
The words sat heavily in his chest.
Not regret exactly.
Not in the way people would assume.
He did not regret Emily.
And somehow that made him feel worse.
Because he should, maybe.
It would make things cleaner.
Simpler.
But he couldn't regret loving someone who had kept him going through some of the darkest years of his existence.
Emily had been good to him.
Gentle with him.
Patient when he had nothing to offer but confusion and pain.
And he hated that no matter how hard he tried, he could not fulfill the promises he made to her.
The vows.
The future.
The life they built together.
His jaw tightened.
"I feel awful about it," he admitted quietly.
Aria looked toward him carefully.
"About Emily?"
He nodded.
"She deserved someone whole."
The words came rougher now.
"And I wasn't."
A bitter laugh slipped from him.
"Hell, I'm still not."
Aria's expression softened slightly, but she didn't interrupt.
So he kept going.
Because once the truth started spilling out lately, it refused to stop.
"When I was with her," he said quietly, staring out into the darkness, "I thought I was building something real."
His throat tightened.
"And it was real for Will and Emily."
That mattered.
He needed Aria to understand that.
Not because he loved Emily more.
Not because he questioned what he felt for Aria.
But because he refused to rewrite the truth just to make this easier for either of them to swallow.
"She helped me survive," he admitted.
A pause.
"And I hate that I couldn't give her the ending she deserved."
Aria stayed quiet beside him.
Listening.
Always listening.
Chase looked up at the stars for a long moment before speaking again.
"When we were younger," he said softly, "I always warned you."
That made her glance toward him again.
"I told you being a soldier meant things could happen."
A bitter smile crossed his face.
"I thought I understood what that meant back then."
He shook his head slowly.
"But I didn't know."
No one could have.
Not really.
"You prepare yourself for deployment. Injury. Death."
His voice dropped lower.
"But nobody prepares for this."
Memory loss.
Identity collapse.
Coming home alive but wrong.
He swallowed hard.
"I think part of me believed if I survived, that would be enough."
Aria's eyes softened painfully.
"But surviving isn't the same thing as coming home."
The truth of that settled deep into both of them.
Chase laughed quietly under his breath then, though there was no humor in it.
"You know what the worst part is?"
"What?"
He looked at her fully now.
"I'm trying so damn hard to become a man worthy of you again..."
His voice cracked slightly.
"And I don't even fully know who that man is anymore."
That hurt to say out loud.
Because it was true.
He felt fractured constantly.
Half memory.
Half instinct.
Half grief.
Half stranger.
He was pieces stitched together pretending to be whole.
And somehow Aria still looked at him with softness in her eyes.
He didn't understand it.
"You're not giving yourself enough grace," she said quietly.
Chase shook his head immediately.
"No."
His answer came firm.
Certain.
"Because if I start excusing this too much, I'll stop fighting to be better."
A pause.
"I can't do that."
He looked down at his hands resting against the railing.
Scarred.
Unsteady.
Real.
"I know I'm not the man who left you," he admitted softly.
"That version of me died somewhere over there."
The words hurt.
But they were true.
"What's left is..." He exhaled slowly. "Something that survived by clawing and tearing it's way back to you."
His eyes lifted to her again.
"And all I can do now is become the best version of that man... me as possible."
A beat.
"For you."
Aria's breath caught slightly.
But Chase wasn't finished.
"Not because you're asking me to," he continued quietly. "And not because I think it guarantees I get you back."
His throat tightened.
"But because you deserve somebody whole standing beside you."
His gaze stayed locked on hers now.
"And if there's any chance at all that I get to love you again someday..."
A pause.
"I want to do it as a man worthy of what you gave me."
The night settled around them softly after that.
Still.
Heavy.
Beautiful in a painful kind of way.
"A second chance."
And standing there beneath the stars with her beside him, Chase realized something he had never fully understood before.
Love was not just wanting someone.
It was becoming someone capable of protecting what they gave you.
And for the first time since he came home.
He finally understood how badly he wanted to try.
For Aria, for himself... for what was left and what would become.
Author's Note