Twenty-Seven
Sienna
The house is silent when I slip out of bed.
I’m not sure what I’m doing. I told myself I was hungry, but I’m halfway down the stairs when I admit the truth. I can’t sleep.
The kitchen is cast in soft darkness, the only light coming from the microwave clock glowing green. I pad across the tile and open the fridge more out of habit than appetite. The cool air hits my skin. Shelves of leftover pasta, bottled sauces, some cake I don’t remember being there earlier. None of it appeals.
I close the door gently and lean against the counter.
My phone is already in my hand, even though I promised myself I wouldn’t check it again. But I do because I can’t stop thinking about today.
The tight line of Nathan’s shoulders. The way his jaw clenched when his mother hurled poison at him and his brother slithered through the room like a bad memory come to life.
I can’t stop wondering if he’s okay. What state he’s walking back into. If he’s sleeping at all. If he’s still cleaning up her mess or just sitting in the dark.
I’m about to text him when a voice cuts through the quiet.
“What are you doing up?”
I jump hard enough to nearly knock over the fruit bowl. My dad stands in the doorway, hair rumpled, face creased with sleep.
“Jesus, Dad,”
I exhale, clutching my chest. “Scared the hell out of me.”
He grins, unfazed. “Sorry. You’re not exactly subtle in those bunny slippers.”
I glance down. Damn traitorous slippers.
“I couldn’t sleep,”
I say, brushing hair off my face. “Still jetlagged.”
He nods like he doesn’t believe me but isn’t calling me out. He crosses to the sink, fills a glass, and takes a long drink. I watch the motion, familiar and comforting. God, I missed him.
I remember handing Nathan’s mother a glass of water earlier, and the comparison nearly knocks the breath from my lungs. That whole house felt like walking into someone’s pain. Dense and cold and so lonely.
“Dad?”
He turns toward me just as I cross the kitchen. I wrap my arms around him without warning.
He huffs a quiet laugh into my hair. “Missed you too, kid.”
I roll my eyes against his chest. “I’m twenty-five. You can probably retire that nickname.”
“Never,”
he says, pulling back slightly to look at me. “You going to tell me what really has you wandering around the house in the dark like a ghost?”
I hesitate. “It’s not… I mean, it’s not a big deal.”
His brow lifts, a you-know-better look. “It’s Nathan, isn’t it? Love sick are you?”
He grins. “I told him he could’ve taken the spare room.”
“No, it’s not like that,”
I say quickly, shaking my head. “It’s just… earlier today, we were at his mom’s. Something happened with her.”
His expression sobers.
“I’m not going to give you the details because it’s not my story to tell,”
I go on. “But it was bad, Dad. And he just… took it. Carried it all like it was normal.”
My father leans against the counter, arms folded.
“I knew,”
I admit softly, “that he had some stuff with his family, but I didn’t know how deep it went. And the way he looked afterward—like it wasn’t even anger anymore, just…weight. Like he’s always waiting for the next blow.”
He nods slowly. “I never got along with my father.”
I drop my gaze. “I know.”
“Not really, you don’t.”
His voice is quiet. “He was hard. Harsh. The kind of man who thought discipline was the same as love. He never really wanted kids—at least not the kind who had opinions.”
He takes another sip of water. “Some people aren’t cut out to be parents. That’s not an excuse. It just is.”
I lean back against the fridge, watching him.
“What we make of that is up to us,”
he says, eyes on the glass in his hand. “But that doesn’t mean it doesn’t hurt. Doesn’t mean you don’t still carry the kid version of you somewhere, wondering why they didn’t love you right.”
The ache in my chest cracks wider because I know that version of Nathan. I saw it today in every strained breath, every clenched fist, every time he looked like he was swallowing something sharp.
“I don’t think anyone’s ever shown him how to let someone help,”
I whisper.
My father meets my eyes. “Then maybe you’re the first.”
“Maybe,”
I lie, forcing a smile because I know this doesn’t last beyond this week.
My dad sets his empty glass down on the counter with a soft clink and crosses his arms. He must sense the shift in me because he thankfully changes the subject. “You know, I was thinking about redoing the back fence this summer.”
“The one that’s been standing just fine since 1998?”
He grunts. “It leans.”
“It’s rustic,”
I deadpan.
“It’s a hazard. I’ve got grandkids coming soon.”
My eyebrows shoot up. “From who? Because if you’re putting that pressure on me again, I swear to God—”
“Relax.”
He waves me off, smiling to himself. “Jeremy and Grace are already planning. I’m just saying, maybe I’ll throw in a little fire pit, too.”
“Sounds good, Dad.”
“You still working that job you like so much?”
“I am,”
I say, and I can’t help smiling. “It’s good. Busy.”
He narrows his eyes. “You letting some stiff in a suit boss you around?”
“Never,”
I reply with mock offense. “I’m the boss.”
“Damn right you are.”
He gives me a wink and pushes off the counter. “Alright, I’m going back to bed before your mother realizes I’m not snoring and makes me do something.”
“Good luck.”
“Night, kid.”
“Goodnight, Dad.”
He disappears down the hallway, and I stay behind, arms folded on the counter. The kitchen is still too quiet. I check the time on my phone for the hundredth time tonight, chewing my bottom lip before tapping out a message.
Me: I know it’s late, but I hope everything went okay.
I stare at the screen, already regretting it. He won’t answer. Maybe he’s asleep. Maybe he’s—
My phone lights up.
Incoming call: Nathan Calloway
Shit.
I fumble to answer, pressing the phone to my ear like I didn’t just text him thirty seconds ago.
“Hello?”
I whisper.
“Sienna.”
He sounds exhausted. His voice is a little rough, like gravel and heartbreak.
Just hearing him makes something tug painfully in my chest.
I sink onto a kitchen stool, curling my legs under me. “What are you doing awake?”
“I was about to ask you the same thing.”
It’s on the tip of my tongue to admit the truth. That I was worried. That I’ve been thinking about him since the moment he dropped me off.
“I was hungry,”
I say instead.
He huffs a tired laugh. “Hungry?”
“Craving a greasy burger.”
“That so?”
“Mhm.”
“Any fries with that lie, or just the burger?”
I roll my eyes even though he can’t see me. “I should’ve gone with something more realistic, huh?”
“Maybe. You strike me more as a midnight cereal kind of girl.”
“What is that supposed to mean?”
“You own at least four boxes of sugary cereal marketed to children, don’t you?”
“Lucky Charms are a lifestyle.”
“Sure they are.”
My stomach grumbles. “Kinda craving that burger for real now.”
There’s a beat of silence between us, and for a second, all I hear is the faint creak of a door and the distant shuffle of movement.
My stomach knots. “You’re still there?”
“Just locking up.”
“Is everything okay?”
His car door shuts. I hear the engine turn over. “It’s fine. She’s sleeping it off.”
“And you?”
“I’m good.”
He says it too fast. Too easily.
I hear the rhythmic click of his turn signal.
“I can’t believe you’re calling me from the car like we’re teenagers,”
I murmur. “What’s next? You drive by my house with the windows down playing In Your Eyes?”
He chuckles again, and this time, it’s a little stronger. “No promises.”
“God, I feel fifteen. I’m going to get in trouble if someone catches me talking to a boy this late.”
“Should I whisper sweet nothings into the receiver?”
he teases. “Or send you a mixtape?”
“A mixtape? What is it? 1994?”
“Fine,”
he says. “Spotify playlist.”
“That’s more like it.”
We lapse into a comfortable silence, the kind that fills rather than weighs.
“Hey, Sienna?”
he says, his voice lower, almost hesitant.
“Yeah?”
“I’m glad you texted.”
I press the phone tighter to my ear, a smile blooming despite myself. “Me too.”
Neither of us says goodnight.
We just… keep talking.
About nothing. Everything. Somehow, we spend ten minutes debating whether pancakes or waffles would win in a street fight. He said pancakes were more “emotionally stable.”
I told him that was the dumbest thing I’d ever heard, and also… correct.
I’m mid-sentence, halfway through a riveting story about why vending machines in airports are always out of M&Ms, when I notice the faint glow of headlights filtering through the narrow front windows by the door.
I glance toward the hallway.
Ignore it.
Keep talking.
But then a shadow flickers across the glass.
My stomach drops.
My voice lowers to a whisper. “Nathan?”
“Yeah?”
“I might die tonight.”
There’s a pause on the line. “Excuse me?”
“If I do,”
I whisper, sliding off my stool and tiptoeing toward the butcher block, “tell the cops the guy was about six-three, broad shoulders, mysterious aura. Possibly wearing a leather jacket.”
“Sienna.”
“I knew I should have taken those self-defense classes. God, this is how it ends. In bunny slippers.”
“Sienna,”
he says again, still amused, still not taking me seriously.
“I’m grabbing a knife.”
“Please don’t.”
“I have to. If I’m going down, I’m going down fighting. I will not be tomorrow’s cautionary true crime podcast.”
There’s a beat of silence. Then, very calmly, he says, “Open the damn door.”
I freeze.
Wait.
Hold on.
I creep closer, peeking through the peephole, and nearly drop the knife.
Because there he is.
Tall. Tired. Smirking.
Still on the phone.
I hang up just as I yank the door open, and sure enough, Nathan stands on the porch with a navy shirt and slacks, one hand in his pocket, the other still holding his phone, eyes locked on the absolute gremlin I must look like.
His gaze drops to my bunny slippers.
Then the knife.
Then back up to me.
“I’m just going to take this,”
he says softly, reaching forward and curling his hand gently around my wrist. He slides the knife out of my grip and sets it on the hallway table. “There we go. No need for murder.”
My brain stutters. “What are you doing here?”
“We’re going for greasy burgers.”
I blink at him, speechless, before feeling a grin curling on my mouth. “Extra cheese?”
“And bacon.”
God, this man.
My smile feels like it’s going to split my face in half. “You drove all the way back here just to get burgers?”
“No,”
he says. “I drove back because you weren’t going to sleep, and neither was I. Figured burgers were the next logical step.”
I bite my lip, my heart doing that annoying fluttery thing that makes me want to slap it. “You know I’m not dressed, right?”
His gaze flicks down again, amusement dancing in his eyes. “Might want to change your footwear from roadkill to something a bit more practical.”
I look down at my bunny slippers.
“You’re judging me,” I accuse.
“Hard.”
I laugh and step back, already turning. “Give me five minutes.”
He leans against the doorframe. “Take seven. I’ll allow it.”
“Such generosity,” I mutter.
And I swear, as I disappear upstairs, I hear him chuckle and say under his breath, “Worth the drive.”