Chapter 28 #2
I clenched my mouth shut after my uncomfortable display of vulnerability, but what was it they said about insanity?
Doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different response.
I was over my default responses. In fact, they exhausted me.
Fear and avoidance had been driving my bus in the wrong direction of life for too long, and it was time to take back the wheel.
Which is probably why it felt like I was driving around with an L-plate taped to my forehead and every decision was exhausting.
I looked up from beneath my lashes to see Dax’s mouth curved into a smile that filled his face. It didn’t make me feel completely ill. So that was a start. He said nothing, but his eyes told me everything. No anger. No disappointment. Just the same look he’d given me the night we kissed.
“I’m proud of you,” he whispered, locking my gaze. “You’ve fucking got this.”
I wanted to self-combust on the spot—but I forced myself to stand there facing him.
His fingertips grazed down my arms for the briefest moment, then dropped away.
I turned and walked up the steps to Bellamy House.
Thank God for that thigh-high split—otherwise this might’ve been a deeply ungraceful sideways wriggle.
Looking back over my shoulder, I noticed Dax was still watching.
I grinned so wide I knew my dimple was on full display.
The musty smell hit me the moment I stepped inside. How could it still reek like an old lady’s closet after all this time?
I joined Denis and June in the kitchen, where he was explaining how we could mimic a stovetop fire. My eyes roamed the latched cupboards—finally free of their padlocks—and I felt relief at the thought they’d soon be ashes.
“One of your terms was to set the fire yourself,” Denis said, leaning back against the bench, arms folded across his chest. “Is that still the case?”
I glanced around the kitchen again, but something felt off. That tugging sensation returned—like someone pulling on an invisible thread—and I couldn’t ignore it.
“I do,” I nodded. “I just—”
The thought emerged as if someone had dropped it from the sky. “This isn’t the right room.”
I paced around the kitchen, processing my own words.
“This way,” I grinned, and I strode back towards the main foyer and up the stairs, taking them two at a time.
I stood with my hands on my hips in the small office at the top of the stairs, its door still stretched out like carpet.
This was definitely the place. I felt the burning rage from earlier roll through me like a wave again, but it quickly transformed into some sort of prickling ecstasy.
June hovered in the doorway as Denis stepped over the fallen door.
“This one?” he asked.
“This one,” I nodded.
Denis ran a hand along his jaw as he walked the room, peering into the closet before moving around the walls.
“This was an office?”
“Of sorts,” I replied, noticing June hadn’t moved.
“Do you want to wait outside?” I asked gently as her eyes darted frantically around the space.
June shook her head. Then nodded. Her fingers fastened and unfastened the same button on her jacket.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t think I’d find it so…”
“Don’t apologise.” I crossed the room and took her hands in mine. “I had a worse reaction the first time I even thought about coming up these stairs. You’re doing better than I did. Wait with Dax, if you want.”
“Are you sure? I feel so guilty. You wanted us to do this together, and I can’t even—”
“I wanted you here because this place is where it all started. It’s where we became a family—for better or worse.” I squeezed her hand. “But you only need to be inside if it’ll do you some good. Otherwise, I’ve got this.”
And I did. I really did.
She took a shaky swig from her water bottle. I bet she really wished it were vodka now.
“Do it for us?” she asked, backing towards the stairs.
“For us. For Josh,” I nodded.
And for every Olivia Pratt who’d walked through these doors.
I was going to burn this fucker to the ground.
Once June was safely outside, I turned back to Denis. I blinked at the candle he was setting up on an overturned box near the curtains. Had he been carrying that thing in his pocket this whole time?
I’d expected something a bit more… dramatic. I don’t know—jerry-rigged wiring, exposed sockets, maybe a few sparks. A MacGyver moment.
Instead, he balled up some old computer paper scattered across the floor, giving the flame plenty of options to spread.
He handed me a box of long matches, and my bare arms prickled for the first time that night.
“Once you light it, you leave the room immediately,” he said. “We’ll monitor the burn from the doorway.”
As he spoke, two women and a man in turnout gear arrived in the corridor.
“You’ll then evacuate outside the gate. There’s someone stationed at the door to direct you.”
I dipped my head in response. Leader Denis was firm.
Drinking led to regrettable emotional outbursts for me, rather than the clarity it seemed to afford Mr Gavellin.
I was mildly jealous. I reached between my full chest again to gather a folded letter, and Denis looked down at his shoes, his cheeks colouring.
The message on this letter was short and simple, unlike the one that had arrived when I was seven.
“To our beautiful granddaughter,” I read out loud as Denis’s gaze stayed focused on his shoes. I willed my brain to remember to ask him for his polishing tips later; they could come in handy for the café floors.
“We’ve followed everything we could about your life over the years, involving ourselves where we could.
To our regret, it wasn’t much. However, if the accusations about Bellamy Children’s Home—where we know you were taken when Daisy passed—are to be believed, then it’s likely you’ve experienced something no child ever should.
Especially not a grieving one. We’ll carry that regret for eternity.
Please take this opportunity to close this chapter of your life however feels right for you. With our deepest love, Oma and Opa.”
I held the letter between my glossed lips, dragged a match across the box, and let the flame grow.
Denis waited in the corner as I crouched next to the candle and dropped the letter into the crumpled paper, lighting the wick.
A strange emptiness spread through me as I stood and walked from the room. The house creaked under my feet. It could have been something more. It could have been filled with love instead of fear. A safety net that so many children who came through these doors had never experienced.
I exhaled the regret. My insides clawed with the echoes of children’s voices, still caught in the walls.
“This is for you,” I whispered as I stepped outside.
I turned and looked up at the flickering light at the top of the stairs.
“This is for all of you.”
I let the image return—the one I’d seen during Olivia’s funeral.
“For us,” I whispered to her.
And smiled as the vision dissolved in the growing flame.