6. Meredith
MEREDITH
“The motion to suppress is granted. Given the falsified evidence, the court finds that the government cannot proceed. All charges are hereby dismissed.”
The sheer relief of finally hearing those words has me practically floating back to the hotel.
June is going home. Home.
I didn’t want to drag her to Boston with me when there was a direct flight to Nantucket less than three hours after we finished up in court.
I’m not even sure she realized I’d dropped her off at the airport, given the state of shock she seemed to be in.
Her newfound freedom clearly hadn’t quite sunk in as she stared, wide-eyed, at the masses of people that still existed outside our little bubble.
I send out a silent prayer, hoping that she makes it back safely.
It’s almost sad how silent the suite is now.
How empty it looks, now that I’ve gathered all my stray research and miscellaneous stationery, and now there aren’t court documents practically plastered to every available surface.
Now June’s cardigans aren’t flung over the back of the chairs, and our shoes aren’t lined up next to the door.
Now, Mark’s things—an entire box containing everything he’s managed to neglect and leave scattered around over the last few months—sit by the door.
It’s the end of an awful era, but there’s a pang of wistfulness nonetheless that has nothing to do with the short stack of papers on the table before me.
No, as I slowly make my way through, signing with a utilitarian efficiency, it’s not wistfulness I feel—it’s certainty.
M. Holloway.
Over and over and over.
The déjà vu is a little funny, a smile shared between me and the cosmic joke that is my life.
I’m almost done with the last form when the door opens.
“Meredith?” Mark calls. “Please tell me you didn’t leave without?—”
He stops when he sees me at the table.
Sees the papers.
Sees the pen in my hand.
“It looks really empty in here now, huh?” he says lightly, lifting a brow. “Doing some last-minute paperwork?”
I don’t even sigh. “Don’t.”
He walks toward me anyway, a picture of easy confidence right up until he reaches the table and actually registers the header on the top page. Petition for Dissolution of Marriage.
He goes still.
Then he laughs. “You’re doing this now? June was cleared three hours ago.”
“Yep,” I say, popping the P. “It’s over, isn’t it? You knew this was always my intention.”
He circles the table warily so that he can face me properly. “You told my father?—”
“I told your father I’d consider it. And I have. But now June is safe, and I just want to go home, and there’s no reason to prolong this any more than it needs to.”
“Meredith.”
I scribble upon the final line and click my pen closed. “I want my life back, Mark.”
He sinks into the chair across from me, arms bracing on the armrests as if he’s some magnanimous king. “I could give that to you, you know.”
I set the pen down.
“We could get you your job back,” he continues, undeterred by my silence. “Same salary, same authority. We worked well together on this, didn’t we? We could rebuild things.”
I let out a brittle laugh. “You think this is about my career?”
He swallows. “You could come home, Meredith. You could move back into our apartment. You could have it if you wanted. I wouldn’t need to stay there, either, if you needed a moment to settle back in.”
My memories of that beautiful glass tower and the perfectly curated home thirteen floors up begin to flood my mind. The dinner parties, the holiday celebrations, the birthdays, the anniversaries. All the smiles, food, and love shared.
The cardigans flung over the backs of chairs never lingered. The fridge magnet from my trip to Nebraska vanished from the flawless chrome. The wine glass that always stayed in my hand, for fear it would not be there by the time I returned to it.
“Yeah, I’m sure your PA would be more than happy to accommodate you in the meantime.”
This cracks his controlled fa?ade like porcelain dropped on stone. “You can’t sit there and tell me you still care about that. Meredith, she’s not even in my phone anymore.”
I gape at him. “Are you serious?”
Apparently, he is. “You’ve been in Nantucket for months. Sleeping with him all summer. I’d say we’re pretty even at this point.”
“That is not the same thing.”
He’s reaching for me now, hands across the table. When I flinch away, he stares up at me in despair. “They mean nothing, Meredith. They don’t matter. They don’t matter to us. You have to see that. Come on. Don’t do this.”
The audacity is enough to short-circuit my brain.
“What happened to knowing that you broke my heart?” I finally splutter out, only half-believing this conversation is real. Weren’t we just talking about this? “What happened to you not deserving my forgiveness? I thought you knew how much you hurt me!”
“I’m not asking you to forgive me right now.” His eyes bulge as I get up from the table sharply. “We just need more time. Meredith. Stop it. Meredith!”
“Don’t.” I slide the papers into a folder and smooth the edges. Everything is efficient, controlled, and tidy, just as Mark always loved it. “I’m going to Boston to file this. Then I’m going home.”
He shakes his head as he pushes himself to stand on shaking arms. “You don’t have to go through with this.”
“Yes,” I say, picking up the folder. “I do.”
He moves. I move away. He follows.
For a moment, we’re close enough that I can feel his breath, smell his cologne, and almost lose myself to his desperation.
“I don’t want to lose you,” he whispers.
“You already did.”
He steps back first.
I walk past him, folder tucked under my arm, heart cracking in the same old places. But at least this time, I know I’ll be all right.
“Goodbye, Mark.”
June 2026
Richard taps his foot in that impatient, rhythmic way that makes my jaw clench. The plastic of our conjoined chairs vibrates with each bounce of his heel. If I hadn’t mastered it before I could walk, I imagine I’d probably be feeling pretty seasick right about now.
As it stands, I don’t need another reason to feel nauseous.
“I told you it was getting worse,” he mutters, staring straight ahead at the double doors to the ward. “She’s been coughing for days.”
“And we brought her in last week,” I remind him, arms folded tightly. “We did everything we could.”
It’s a testament to our fragile truce that he doesn’t attempt to blame this on me again. Or that I know it’s not me he blames at all.
He’s sat there, replaying the day in his mind, trying to find a moment of weakness in our response time to figure out what we could’ve done differently. These things matter, after all, when the stakes are life or death.
Eleanor’s skin was clammy under my hands, and her breathing was shallow enough for me to call Richard in for a second opinion. We kept her under our rudimentary monitoring before finally making the call after no marked improvement. It was perfectly by the book; this trip was absolutely necessary.
“She was fine last night.” He looks older in this lighting, the fluorescence really bringing out the depth of the lines on his face.
“I thought so, too,” I admit. “But she didn’t eat dinner, and she was confused this morning.”
“She always gets confused,” he snaps, then winces. “Sorry. I just…I hate this waiting.”
For once, we agree.
I’m saved from responding when the elevator dings and three figures spill out.
Sophie, frantically dragging Trent right behind her. And June.
I blink.
It feels like I’m seeing her for the first time in a while. Weeks? No. If I’m honest, months.
I’m not entirely surprised that we’ve drifted.
After living practically down each other’s throats for those months in New York and seeing her in the aftermath of that horrible conversation with Ashton, it makes sense that she needed some space.
And from the way she’s been avoiding my texts, hanging out at the beach house is pretty low on her list of stress-free activities, too.
Out of all of us, she deserves a break the most.
“Mer?” Sophie calls, rushing forward.
I stand as they all approach, just in time for Sophie to fling her arms around me. Over her shoulder, June offers a tight nod, not looking me in the eye. Mouth set in a grim line.
“What happened?” Sophie asks, breathless as she pulls away.
“I don’t know yet.” I glance toward the ward doors. “They’re running tests. Her fever spiked this morning and didn’t recover, so we thought it best to bring her in to be safe.”
Her face crumples, and Trent wraps an arm around her automatically. A pang of pride dully thumps against my chest at the sight. The kid looks about a second away from crying, too.
“How long have you been here?”
June’s grim expression hasn’t changed one iota at the news.
“A couple of hours. They took her back pretty quickly,” I say, wincing slightly as June glances down at her phone. “Sorry, it took us a while to get a signal. There’s been no news since.”
“Nothing?” June asks, voice thin.
“No,” I answer gently. “But they’ll come talk to us soon.”
Richard clears his throat pointedly, and the three of them finally acknowledge his presence.
“Dr. Callahan is familiar with Eleanor’s case.
She’s in good hands.” He says it as if to reassure himself more than us, but my sisters seem so shocked that he would even attempt that, that they don’t ask any follow-ups.
We sink into the cluster of chairs. Sophie and Trent fidget with the jacket the teen has thrown over their knees, both glancing at the double doors and whispering soft reassurances to each other.
June sits perfectly still. Her hands are clasped in her lap, knuckles white.
I find myself studying her. The silence between us feels oddly personal, beyond our shared anxiety around our mother’s condition. I get the sudden urge to break it, but I ignore it.