Chapter 8 Noah
I barely slept.
Every time I closed my eyes, I felt the kiss again—the soft give of her mouth, the way her fingers had curled into my shirt, the quiet sound she made when I stopped being careful.
It played on a loop with the look on Lily’s face when she had run back to us at the festival, smiling like the night was the best thing that had ever happened.
By morning the weight in my chest had settled into something heavy and familiar.
Guilt.
Fear.
The hard knowledge that I had let a crack form in the life I had built to keep my daughter safe.
Tessa arrived at the shop at her usual time.
I heard her car on the gravel and stayed at the far workbench longer than necessary, sanding a board that did not need more sanding.
When I finally looked up, she was already at the folding table, laptop open, the festival banners and business cards arranged in neat stacks for final review.
“Morning,” she said. Her voice was steady, but her eyes searched my face.
“Morning.” I kept my own voice even. Professional. “Printer delivered early. Boxes are by the door.”
She waited a beat, as if expecting more. When nothing came, she nodded and turned back to the screen.
The morning passed in careful distance. I answered her questions about quantities and placement with short, practical sentences.
I did not stand close enough to catch the light scent of her shampoo.
I did not let our eyes hold longer than the work required.
Every time the memory of the kiss rose, I pushed it down hard and reached for the next tool.
Lily noticed first.
She came in after school with her backpack bouncing and stopped halfway to Tessa’s table when she saw the space I was keeping. Her gaze moved between us, thoughtful and a little uncertain.
“Are you mad at Miss Tessa?” She asked me in a stage whisper that carried across the shop.
“No, bug. Just busy.”
Tessa’s shoulders tightened almost imperceptibly. She gave Lily a warm smile that did not quite reach her eyes. “Come show me what you drew in school. I could use a good horse.”
I watched them together—the easy way Lily leaned into her side, the careful attention Tessa gave every crayon line—and the fear sharpened. Lily was already attaching. If Tessa left after the festival the way she had always planned, the quiet that followed would not only be mine to carry.
Around five I walked over to the folding table with the final invoice and the signed approval sheet.
“Everything looks good,” I said. “You can send the last files whenever they’re ready. Payment will clear by the end of the week.”
Tessa looked up slowly. The warmth that usually lived in her expression had cooled into something more guarded.
“That’s it?”
“That’s the job.”
Silence stretched. The radio in the corner played a low song neither of us listened to. Dust floated in the late light coming through the high windows.
“Last night happened,” she said quietly.
“I know.”
“And today you’re acting like it didn’t.”
I set the papers on the table. My hands needed something to do. “It can’t happen again. Lily’s already asking questions. The whole town saw us leave the square together. I can’t give her something that has an end date built in.”
Tessa’s jaw tightened. “So you get to decide for both of us.”
“I get to protect my daughter.” The words came out harder than I intended. “I’ve done it alone for four years. I’m not going to let her get hurt because I couldn’t keep my head straight around a temporary design contractor.”
The moment the sentence left my mouth I regretted the cold edge of it. Tessa sat very still. The lively energy she carried into every room had drawn inward, leaving her smaller somehow.
“Temporary,” she repeated. “Right.”
She closed the laptop with deliberate care and began packing her things. The soft sounds of zipper and paper felt too loud in the quiet shop. When she stood, portfolio under her arm, she looked at me once more.
“You didn’t have to make it ugly, Noah.”
“I know.”
She left. The shop door slid shut behind her with a low final sound. I stood in the middle of the concrete floor and listened to her car disappear down the road until there was nothing left but the wind in the pines and the heavy beat of my own pulse.
Lily came out of the office, sketchbook hugged to her chest.
“Is Miss Tessa coming back tomorrow?”
I crouched so we were eye level. Her serious gray-blue eyes—my eyes, Erin’s seriousness—searched my face.
“The design work is almost finished, bug. She might not need to be here every day.”
Lily’s lower lip threatened to tremble before she pressed it flat. “I liked when she was here.”
“I know.”
I pulled her into a hug and felt her small arms lock around my neck. The scent of her strawberry shampoo mixed with the ever-present cedar of the shop. Over her shoulder, I stared at the empty folding table and the space where Tessa’s coffee cup usually sat.
That night, after Lily was asleep, I stood in the bedroom doorway and looked at Erin’s photograph.
The old guilt rose clean and sharp. I had kissed another woman under the pines while the town lights glowed behind us.
I had let myself want something that could rearrange the careful life I had built from the wreckage of the first one.
I turned the picture down.
Then, after a long minute, I turned it back up.
Wanting Tessa did not erase what Erin had meant. But letting Lily get hurt because I was too much of a coward to either step forward or step cleanly away would be its own kind of failure.
I had chosen the cold professional version of myself today because it felt safer.
It did not feel safer now.
It only felt empty.