Chapter 24
My first surprise was in the guest room.
It wasn’t a dramatic reveal. No one cleared their throat or waited expectantly.
No one said my name in that careful way people use when they’re bracing for your reaction.
One minute I was half-watching the end of Shrek, mostly listening to the familiar cadence of it while my body slid toward that heavy, bone-deep tiredness, and the next I was standing in the doorway of the room I’d been sleeping in all week, hand already reaching for the light switch out of habit.
I stopped short.
The room looked… different.
Not in the way of fresh paint or new furniture or anything that screamed ta-da. It was quieter than that. Softer. Like someone had turned the volume down on the space itself.
I stood there longer than necessary, blinking like the room might snap back into its old version if I looked too closely.
The first thing I noticed was the light.
The harsh overhead glare was gone, replaced with warm, adjustable lamps that made the corners feel rounded instead of sharp.
The shadows were gentle, the kind that didn’t make your brain invent things in them.
I exhaled without realizing I’d been holding my breath.
Okay. Weird.
I stepped inside slowly, shoes still on, as if the room might object to my presence.
Then I saw the blanket.
It was folded at the foot of the bed, thick and soft-looking, the kind of fuzzy that promised warmth without suffocation. I reached out before I could overthink it, dragging my fingers across the fabric. It was heavy in a comforting way, like being anchored instead of trapped.
“Oh,” I murmured, because apparently my vocabulary had left the building.
I picked it up, surprised by the weight, and let it drape over my forearms. My shoulders dropped another inch. My body, traitor that it was, reacted immediately, recognizing comfort before my mind could interrogate it.
I hadn’t realized how cold I’d been.
The shelves came next. New, clean-lined, installed with care and filled with some of my favourite things - a photo of my parents and I, a stuffed animal that Thalia had won for me, and an old photo of Callum and I.
They made the room feel intentional instead of temporary, like I wasn’t just camping out in someone else’s space while my life hovered in limbo.
On the dresser sat a candle.
A wood wick.
I knew because I leaned closer, absurdly focused on it, and saw the thin strip of wood nestled in the wax. I imagined the soft crackle it would make, the grounding sound, the way it would fill the room without demanding attention.
My throat tightened, uninvited.
“Wow,” I said quietly, to no one.
There was lotion too, tucked neatly beside the candle. Nothing flashy. Just… there. The kind of thing you use when you’re trying to remember how to be gentle with yourself again. The kind of thing that assumes you’ll be here long enough to develop a routine.
That thought landed heavier than the rest.
I set the blanket down and sat on the edge of the bed, suddenly very aware of how tired I was. Not just sleepy. The other kind. The kind that lives behind your eyes and in your joints and makes even good surprises feel overwhelming.
I looked around again, slower this time.
Nothing in the room felt like a message. There were no notes, explanations, or obvious fingerprints of intention. It wasn’t trying to say I’m sorry or please come back or look what I did.It just existed, calm and ready, like it had been waiting quietly for me to notice.
That was what got me.
I stood and moved toward the shelves, running my hand along the edge. On one of them sat a small, bright rectangle.
Animal Crossing.
I stared at it for a long second, then snorted despite myself.
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” I muttered.
It was still sealed. Something familiar and gentle and deeply unserious. A game that asked for nothing but time and patience, where the stakes were low and the worst thing that could happen was shaking the wrong tree.
My eyes burned, suddenly, and I sat back down harder than I meant to.
Of course it was Animal Crossing.
I pressed my palms into my thighs and breathed.
Okay. No. We were not doing this. I was not going to cry over a blanket and a video game like some kind of emotionally compromised raccoon.
I lay back on the bed instead, staring at the ceiling.
I thought about Callum, unhelpfully.
My default anger had eased for the moment, and some of the sadness had too.
He hadn’t told me about this.
If he had, I would have been suspicious, defensive, and ready to catalog motives and intentions and all the ways this could be interpreted as manipulation. But he hadn’t said a word. He didn’t give me a warning or do a grand reveal.
The room just was.
I sat up again and pulled the blanket around my shoulders, testing it properly this time. It settled instantly, like it had been waiting for me. My body leaned into it without consulting my pride.
“Traitor,” I told myself faintly.
I glanced toward the door, half-expecting someone to be standing there, watching for my reaction. The hallway was empty. The house was quiet except for the distant hum of the television and the low murmur of voices from the living room.
They were all pretending nothing had happened.
I lay back down, this time fully, curling onto my side and tucking the blanket under my chin. My eyes closed before I’d consciously decided to rest them.
I didn’t feel fixed.
I didn’t feel ready.
But something inside me loosened, just a fraction, like a knot that had been pulled at long enough to finally give a little.
And that, I realized as sleep edged closer, might be enough for tonight.
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My second surprise came the next day.
I told myself I was going back to the house for practical reasons.
Clothes. Shoes. The face wash I liked that didn’t make my skin feel like it was being punished for existing.
Normal things. Manageable things. Things that suggested I was still a person with a life instead of a patient temporarily stored in someone else’s guest room.
Callum’s mother offered to come with me, but I had said no. I needed to do this alone, or at least alone-adjacent, which is apparently my current emotional setting.
The drive felt longer than it should have. Every familiar turn tightened something in my chest, like my body remembered before my brain could catch up. I parked in the driveway and sat there for a full minute with my hands on the steering wheel, staring at the front door like it might bite.
“You’re just getting clothes,” I told myself. “You’re not opening Pandora’s Box. You’re opening a closet.”
The house was quiet when I stepped inside.
Not abandoned quiet. Just still. Lived-in, but waiting.
The air smelled the same. Clean, faintly familiar, with the ghost of laundry detergent and coffee lingering in the background.
I set my bag down by the door and took my shoes off automatically, because muscle memory is rude like that.
I headed for the bedroom first, and that was when I saw the cabinet.
The stupid cabinet.
The one in the hallway that had been slightly crooked for years, the door never quite lining up no matter how many times I’d complained about it. The one I’d threatened to replace myself approximately a dozen times, despite having zero woodworking skills and even less patience.
It was fixed.
Not just fixed. Properly repaired. Aligned. Solid. The door closed smoothly, no resistance, no sag, no mocking creak.
I stared at it like it had personally betrayed me.
“You’ve got to be kidding,” I whispered.
I reached out and opened it, half-expecting it to revert out of spite. It didn’t. It opened cleanly, quietly, obediently. I laughed once, sharp and startled, then pressed my lips together as something unfamiliar tugged at my throat.
Okay. Fine. One cabinet. That didn’t mean anything. People fixed things all the time. This was not a sign. This was not a message. This was… home maintenance.
I turned away quickly and went into the bedroom before I could spiral about cabinetry.
That was where the rest of it waited.
The bed was made. Not hotel-perfect, not stiff and impersonal, but the way I liked it. Corners tucked just enough. Pillows aligned without being aggressive about it. On my nightstand sat my favourite book.
I froze.
It took a second for my brain to register what was wrong, or rather, what was different. The book was in the right place, but it felt… heavier somehow, like it was keeping a secret.
I picked it up slowly, thumb brushing over the worn cover, and opened it without thinking.
A pressed flower slid free and landed against the page.
My breath left me in a rush I hadn’t prepared for.
I stared at it, the delicate, faded thing resting there like it had always belonged. I remembered that day instantly, the way I’d plucked it without thinking, the way I’d rolled it between my fingers while rambling about movies and endings and how nothing ever showed you what came after the kiss.
I hadn’t known he’d kept it.
My eyes blurred before I could stop them, and I blinked hard, annoyed at myself for being ambushed by plant matter.
“No,” I said quietly. “Nope. We are not doing this.”
I closed the book and set it back down with more force than necessary, like that might undo the moment. I turned away and started grabbing clothes randomly, determined to finish what I’d come for and leave before my emotions unionized.
When I filled the bag I moved to the living room, determined to grab whatever else I needed as quickly as I could.
That was when I saw the frame.
It sat on the coffee table, angled just slightly toward where I would normally sit. Inside was an old movie ticket stub, yellowed at the edges, the date faint but legible.
My chest ached.
I remembered that movie. I remembered complaining about him stealing all the popcorn and the way we’d argued afterward about whether the ending was horrible or perfect. I remembered thinking, even then, that this was what being with the right person felt like.
I sank onto the edge of the couch, the room tilting gently as if it, too, needed a moment.
“Damn,” I whispered.
The kitchen was next, because apparently I enjoyed emotional self-sabotage. I walked in on autopilot, opening cabinets without thinking, reaching for the mug I always used because it fit my hands just right.
The small scrap of paper slid out when I lifted it.
I caught it before it hit the floor, fingers trembling now, patience officially gone. I unfolded it slowly, already knowing I wasn’t ready for whatever waited on the page.
It was filled with words describing how much he loved me, how much he missed me, and how he would do anything to change the last month of our lives.
My vision went completely useless halfway through.
I sat down at the table, the chair scraping softly against the floor, and pressed the heel of my hand into my eyes like that might help. It didn’t. The tears came anyway, hot and unstoppable, spilling over before I could marshal any kind of dignity.
I hated that I was crying.
I hated that these small, quiet things were undoing me slightly. I hated that effort, when done this way, could still reach me despite everything I was trying to protect. I hated how things used to be perfect, and then he fucked it all up.
“Damn it,” I whispered, voice breaking completely now.
That was when I felt him before I saw him.
I looked up, breath hitching, and there he was.
Callum stood in the doorway, hands at his sides, expression careful and open in a way that didn’t ask anything of me. He didn’t step closer. He didn’t speak right away. He just stayed where he was, like he understood that this moment wasn’t his to enter.
My chest felt too tight to breathe properly.
“I didn’t know you were here,” I said, because apparently stating the obvious was all I had left.
“I know,” he replied softly.
Silence stretched between us, fragile and humming. I clutched the paper in my hand like proof of something I couldn’t name.
He spoke then, voice steady but quiet.
“You don’t owe me anything. I love you. That won’t stop, even if you walk away forever.”
The words landed heavy and strange and impossibly sincere, and I didn’t know where to put them.
I didn’t respond. I couldn’t. My thoughts were a mess of gratitude and anger and longing and exhaustion, all tangled together in ways I wasn’t ready to sort out.
I looked at him, really looked at him, and realized with a dull ache that loving someone didn’t automatically mean knowing what to do with that love once it had been damaged.
I didn’t know what this meant.
I didn’t know what came next.
All I knew was that something in me had cracked just enough to feel everything at once, and that scared me more than being numb ever had.
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