Midnights (Shadow #1)

Prologue

This has been the longest week of my life.

Yesterday, I buried my grandfather, and the reality of it still refuses to settle in. It doesn’t seem real. It just seems like some cruel joke where I’ll wake up and he’ll still be here, calling me Bird and asking why I look like I haven’t slept in days.

But he isn’t.

One moment, he was here. Solid and real, and then bam. Gone. Just like that.

I keep expecting to hear his voice, to find him sitting in his chair, reading like he always did. Maybe it’s the grief talking, or maybe it’s just that I can’t accept that someone who was part of my life every single day is suddenly nowhere.

It was the same when we lost my grandmother a few years ago. I thought I understood heartbreak back then, but this feels like a hollowing, like part of me was carved out, and I’m just supposed to keep moving like nothing’s changed.

It’s worse because they weren’t just my grandparents. They raised me. My grandfather was my dad in every way that mattered.

The details of how I lost my parents are a little vague.

I was only two when it happened, too young to remember anything.

My grandparents called it a tragic accident, but that’s all they ever said about i.

Whenever I asked, grief clouded their faces, so I stopped pushing. Some wounds, even time can’t touch.

Still, they told me about my parents and the way they met, the things we did as a family, the sound of my mother’s laugh, the color of my father’s eyes.

I don’t remember them, not really, but I know them through the stories, and through the love that still lingered in my grandparents’ voices whenever they spoke about them.

My grandparents moved to the States from Scotland after I was born, wanting to be closer since I was their only grandchild.

My grandfather used to tell me in the first few years after my parents died, all I wanted was to be outside.

I would talk to the flowers, sing to the trees, and whisper to the wind like I was telling secrets.

Whenever I was upset, outside was the first place he would look. He said he could always hear my voice somewhere in the yard. Maybe I thought I was singing to my parents. Maybe I thought that somehow, they could hear me.

I was homeschooled at some point during grade school.

It wasn’t the plan, but it became necessary after the teasing got to be too much.

My wild hair was always covered in dirt from playing outside, and no amount of brushing or product could make it manageable.

I could handle the names, but my grandparents were the ones who had to help me pick things out of it when I got home.

One day, after they had to untangle gum for the third time in a week, my grandmother had enough.

That was the last day I set foot in a public classroom.

She became my teacher, filling my days with more than just math and English. She taught me about plants, herbs, and flowers. What they meant and what they were used for. She told me the earth speaks to those who know how to listen, that nature has a rhythm, a pulse, a whisper of its own.

She also read to me every night. Her stories were always about magic, witches, dragons, fairies, and forgotten realms. Dark fairytales with no guaranteed happy endings.

I loved those the most. They felt so honest and real.

I loved them because life wasn’t a perfect fairytale; it was messy, unpredictable, and laced with shadows.

My grandfather was the opposite. Where my grandmother nurtured, he prepared. He taught me how to defend myself, how to throw a punch without breaking my wrist, and how to plant my feet so I wouldn’t be knocked off balance. He never said where he learned these things, and I never asked.

“There’s always time for a lady to learn how to defend herself,” he’d say with a wink. Then, quieter, like a secret, “If you ever find yourself in a place you don’t want to be, you’ll know how to get out.”

They both insisted on daily meditation, something I wasn’t allowed to skip, no matter how restless I felt. “A sharp mind is as important as a sharp blade,” Grandpa would say. I didn’t understand then. I do now.

When I turned seventeen, my grandmother decided I needed to be around kids my own age.

A week later, I was enrolled in high school.

It was fine, I guess. I made friends. But I never forgot the lessons my grandparents taught me.

I never had to use them, but I’d like to think they’re still there, waiting for the day I might need them.

And now I'm standing in this empty house, surrounded by ghosts and memories, and I don’t know what to do.

My grandparents were my world. They raised me, shaped me, and taught me everything I know, even if some of it felt old-fashioned.

When I dropped out of college to do my own thing, they supported me.

When I started my own company, my grandfather helped me navigate business deals.

And when I admitted I wasn’t happy running it, he was the first to tell me to sell it.

“Do it scared,” he’d say constantly. “because it’s better than doing nothing.”

We were supposed to take a trip to Scotland together. He never told me why the timing had to be just right, only that it wasn’t ever right before. But now?

I didn’t even know he was sick. One minute, he was fine. The next, he was in a hospital bed, and everything unraveled too fast for me to catch it.

Regret claws at me. I should have been here more, called more, visited more. But life got busy. And then I met Chance.

He took up so much of my time, and I let him.

For months, I barely saw my grandpa. It wasn’t until recently that I made a point to visit every week. Now, it doesn’t feel like enough.

“Fuck you, Grandpa.” The words slip out in a whisper, cracking at the edges. “Why did you have to leave me?”

The silence closes in.

I don’t want to do this. Not now. Not ever. Sorting through his things feels like erasing him, piece by piece.

He left everything to me, but I have no idea what I’m supposed to do with it all.

We sorted through some of Marjorie’s things after she passed, donated some of her clothes, and packed away little trinkets.

But most of it stayed exactly where she left it.

Like he couldn't bear to let her go completely.

And now… I get it. More than I ever wanted to.

I know there’s no way I’ll get through all of this in one day. Honestly, I’d be lucky to make a dent even if I spent every day here for a month. But I have the next two weeks off, so I’ll figure it out, or at least come up with some kind of plan.

That’s a start. Right?

Chance and I got into a fight right before I came, which is why I’m here alone. Again.

Apparently, he couldn’t make it to the funeral. He was “too busy with work.” Said it was “too short of notice for him to take the time off."

I guess I can understand that, not everyone has a flexible schedule. But still… funerals aren’t exactly planned in advance.

Chance and my grandpa barely knew each other. He was always too busy to come with me when I visited. Too busy—that’s always his excuse. And maybe it’s valid, but how long do I pretend it doesn’t hurt?

I don’t need someone to solve my problems, but damn. Just showing up would be nice.

We got into it last night, which I hated, especially after the day I had.

The storm outside seemed to echo my mood with every crack of thunder feeling like an extension of my own rage.

The sky howled as the clouds rolled in like an ocean ready to swallow everything whole.

It rained in torrents, as if the world were mourning with me.

When I got here after the service, I was a mess, barely holding myself together.

I tried calling Chance. No answer.

I called again.

And again.

By the time he finally picked up, desperation had settled into my bones. He sounded annoyed. He was acting like he'd already checked out of the conversation before it even started.

He rattled off how busy he was, how sorry he was, but he just couldn’t talk right now.

And then there was my favorite, “Not everyone can put their life on hold.”

That was the exact second something in me snapped and I almost broke up with his ass right then and there.

I knew he’d been stressed. Starting a business isn’t easy. But I wasn’t asking him to fix anything or move any mountains. I just needed him here.

A few hours later, he apologized. Said he was tired. That he didn’t mean it and promised he’d talk to his boss and see if he could take the day off and come down in the morning.

This morning, however, I got another text.

Chance: Headed into the office early. I’ll call you after my meeting.

I didn’t even reply.

At least I have Rachel. She’s my best friend and the closest thing I have to a sister. If she weren’t out of town, I know without question she’d be here right now, forcing me into some ridiculous distraction, determined to make me laugh.

But she isn’t. And I’m alone.

A loud growl from my stomach reminds me that I haven’t eaten since before the service. I force myself into the kitchen, reaching for a glass of water. But when I look up, I freeze.

A photo sits on the counter.

Three people with their arms wrapped around each other, smiling on the porch.

Me. Grandpa. Grandma.

The grief slams into me like a tidal wave before I can brace for it.

The weight on my chest crushes down, and suddenly, the air is too thick.

It feels like all the walls are pressing in.

My vision blurs and a lump forms in my throat as hot tears sting my eyes.

I try to shove it back down and lock it up tight where it can’t reach me, but it’s too late.

The dam cracks wide open, and before I know it, I'm sobbing.

I sink to the floor, curling in on myself as the grief rips through me. Ugly, heaving cries tear out of my chest, making my whole body shake.