Chapter 17
Megan
School has been in full swing for a few days now, and I’m finally starting to feel like I’ve got a rhythm again.
The forty-five-minute drive, the drop-off-line chaos, the buses, the early mornings.
It’s all settling into place. My voice is already half gone from teaching procedures, and my feet hurt in that familiar way they do at the start of every year.
Meanwhile, Mason hasn’t been home on time once this week. Not unusual, but still…it wears on us. We’ve been talking about this coming weekend for days. He isn’t scheduled to work. A whole weekend where we can actually breathe, reconnect, and sleep in.
Mason’s mood’s been off since he walked through the door though. Not mad, just short. Distracted. Like his mind’s somewhere far away and he doesn’t want me to follow him there.
I’d tried to keep the evening light. While I tossed a salad together, I told him about one of my second graders who tried to convince the class the sun is “just a big light bulb in the sky.” Normally, he’d laugh, toss in how he would’ve responded.
Tonight, he just let out a quick laugh without even looking up from rinsing his hands.
When we sat down for dinner, I finally asked him.
“Everything okay?”
“Yeah,” he said. Again…short.
I raised a brow. “Okay…you sure? Because you’ve barely said five words since you got home.”
He sighed through his nose. “Meg, I’m good.”
His tone felt like a knife, because I knew it was a lie.
“You’re not,” I muttered back.
He set his fork down, rubbing a hand over his face like I was exhausting him. “I’m tired. Can we not do this tonight?”
The words were fine. The tone was sharp. And it stung.
“Fine,” I muttered, stabbing at my chicken.
We cleaned up in silence after that. I stayed in the kitchen longer than necessary, pretending to reorganize the pantry just so I didn’t have to walk on eggshells around him again.
My brain started replaying every conversation from the week—every facial expression, every tone shift, every moment he seemed a little…distant. I keep trying to figure out if I did something wrong, if I said something wrong, if I missed something.
I can’t find the answer. But the not knowing is eating at me. A dull anxiety that keeps tightening and tightening.
Now, here I am, standing in the office doorway, praying he lets me in.
“Mason.”
“Yeah?”
I cross the threshold. “What’s wrong?”
He sits up straighter, shakes his head. “Nothing. I wanna talk to you though.”
My stomach knots with an unfamiliar feeling; he’s never said that before.
“Here. Sit.” He reaches for the other chair in the corner and pulls it over to the desk beside him. I hesitate but sit down.
His blue eyes look at me, full of something I don’t recognize. I wish I did, but I don’t. His jaw ticks once.
He takes a deep breath, and then he looks at me…really looks at me. “I need to go over with you…what to do if I don’t come home one day.”
My body goes still. Numb.
“Don’t talk like that,” I whisper.
“I have to.” His voice breaks slightly, and that’s what undoes me. “Because this job isn’t just writing parking tickets and breaking up bar fights. Sometimes, unfortunately, it’s really bad.”
I nod and wipe the corners of my eyes. The last thing I want to be doing is sitting here, looking at my husband of less than three months, discussing this.
“I’ve got a letter. It’s in the bottom drawer, taped under the file folders, in a white envelope. Your name’s on the front.” He pulls open the desk drawer and points. “There’s a list of passwords in there, bank info. Anything and everything you’d need.”
I can’t stop my tears from falling. “Stop. Please.”
“I know. It sucks. But, babe—” He chokes on his words. “I was almost dust last night.”
“What?” My heart sinks. He said nothing last night. He got in late, went back in early this morning. I didn’t see him until this evening.
“There was a call last night. Guy barricaded himself in a house. Said he had his girlfriend and their kid in there. We heard screaming. It was dark. No lights, place was a wreck. And when I turned the corner—”
He swallows.
“He had a gun. I saw it too late. He pulled the trigger and it…it jammed. That’s the only reason I’m still here.”
I can’t breathe. My heart is racing and the air feels too thick.
“What?!” I gasp. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because I didn’t want to relive it.” He shakes his head. “But you deserve to know, and this is why we’re talking about this now.” He gestures to the desk drawer.
“But are you okay?” My hand rests on his shoulder, firm, and I can feel how tense he is.
“Yeah, I’m fine. Travis got him fast. I don’t even remember what happened after that. My heart didn’t stop pounding until I got back to the station.”
“And I was just…here,” I choke out, wiping at tears that won’t stop falling. “Having a glass of wine, talking to Sierra on the phone while I made dinner. Just…living. And you’re out there nearly getting shot.”
My voice cracks hard on the last word, everything inside me splintering at once.
“Sweetheart,” he murmurs, gentle but firm. “I want that for you.” He shifts closer, eyes soft in a way that somehow hurts more. “This is my job. Not yours. I want you having fun and talking with friends. I don’t want you sitting here alone, worrying about me every time I walk out the door.”
His voice drops even quieter, like he’s speaking straight into the rawest part of me.
Like he already knows this broke something open inside me.
I sniffle. It’s sharp, shaky, completely out of control, and before I can fall apart again, Mason reaches out, wraps his hand around my wrist, and tugs me toward him with a gentle, insistent pull.
“Come here,” he whispers. “Don’t cry, baby. C’mere.”
The second I sit in his lap, I melt. I fold into him and my arms fly around his neck—clinging, desperate—and he hugs me even harder, his hands spreading across my back, holding me like he’s my anchor. Because he is.
His heartbeat thuds solid against mine. And the reality of it hits me so hard I almost sob again. He’s still here, still breathing.
I let myself memorize everything about him—his warmth, his smell, the steady rise and fall of his chest. The way his thumb automatically rubs slow circles against my skin every time he’s comforting me, like his body knows exactly what to do, even when the words don’t come.
“I love you,” he murmurs into my hair, voice rough with truth. “And I do my best every single day to make sure I come home to you.”
My throat tightens. I squeeze him harder, my fingers curling into the back of his shirt. “I need you to,” I whisper. “I can’t do this life alone. I don’t want to.”
His arms tighten around me in response, the kind of hold that feels like a vow.
We sit there, wrapped up in each other, the office quiet except for our breathing. The house feels still, the world paused, like even time is giving us space to fall apart and put ourselves back together again.
For a long time, neither of us moves.