Chapter Four
Crew
Crew Donnelly had once blocked a slapshot with his ribs and finished the shift.
That had been less painful than watching Marin Webb read a comment that told the truth like it was entertainment.
Funny how everybody forgot he left her once already.
No.
Nobody had forgotten.
Not really.
Honeybrook had simply decided that if pain happened three years ago, it was old enough to decorate.
Crew stood at the edge of the square with his phone buzzing in his hand and Marin ten feet away from him looking like she might either cry, punch him, or turn into smoke.
He deserved all three.
Possibly in that order.
Around them, Honeybrook had gone quiet in the unnatural way people went quiet when they were still watching but wanted credit for being respectful.
Phones were still raised.
Of course they were.
Everyone wanted the ending.
Small towns loved endings.
They loved weddings, funerals, fireworks, ribbon cuttings, retirement speeches, baby announcements, and any moment where two people stood close enough to become a theory.
They did not love the messy middle.
The ugly part.
The part where a twenty-year-old kid with too many expectations and not enough courage looked at the girl who loved him and made leaving sound temporary because he was too afraid to admit he did not know how to come back.
Crew had done that.
Not the town.
Not the internet.
Not Wilder.
Crew.
His phone buzzed again.
Then again.
Then so many times it felt less like technology and more like a medical condition.
He glanced down.
The group chat was no longer a group chat.
It was a crime scene.
CREW DONNELLY HOMETOWN EMOTIONAL SURVEILLANCE UNIT
Frankie: HE APOLOGIZED IN PUBLIC.
Frankie: HE USED HIS CAPTAIN VOICE.
Frankie: I AM UNWELL.
Wilder: In my defense—
Sutton: No.
Cooper: Nobody post anything.
Hayes: Too late.
Beck: why did I just see this on my aunt’s Facebook
Junie: because your aunt has better surveillance than our coaching staff
Reese: Crew, are you okay?
Milo: Nobody answer except Crew.
Frankie: I MADE A GRAPHIC BUT I AM HOLDING IT BACK AS PERSONAL GROWTH.
Sutton: Show me before you destroy lives.
Wilder: This is very moving.
Cooper: Wilder, stop experiencing this out loud.
Crew locked the phone.
Then immediately unlocked it because a private text came in from Wilder.
Wilder: I know I’m the reason this started. I’m sorry. Real sorry, not funny sorry. Tell me what to fix.
Crew stared at the message.
He was angry at Wilder.
Of course he was.
Wilder had turned Crew’s private life into content with one unfiltered sentence and a livestream.
But Wilder had not left Marin at a bus station.
Wilder had not ignored six calls the week after because hearing her voice would have made him come home.
Wilder had not let silence harden into history.
Crew typed back.
Crew: Stop posting. Stop commenting. Tell the team the same.
Wilder replied almost instantly.
Wilder: Done.
Then:
Wilder: Sutton already threatened to put my phone in rice without the rice.
Crew almost smiled.
Almost.
Across the sidewalk, Marin was still looking at him.
The whole square had seen the comment now. He could feel it. The ripple had moved outward person by person, screen by screen, mouth to ear, private pain becoming public weather.
Then Dotty’s comment rose under the new video.
Oh, honey. He still loves her.
Crew saw the exact second Marin read it.
Saw the way her face shut down.
Not angry.
Worse.
Guarded.
Marin had many forms of anger. Crew knew most of them.
Bakery anger. Committee anger. Talia-stop-helping anger.
Customer-service anger, which was terrifying because it came with a smile.
Old-hurt anger, which got quiet and careful and left him feeling like someone had opened his chest with a letter opener.
This was different.
This was retreat.
He took one step toward her.
She took one step back.
Good.
That was the answer.
Crew stopped.
Talia moved beside Marin, sunglasses pushed to the top of her head, iced coffee in one hand and murder in both eyes.
“You,” she told Crew, “are going to stand right there and not follow her.”
“Yes,” Crew said.
Marin looked away.
Talia softened for her. Not for him.
“Bakery,” Talia said.
Marin nodded once and walked inside Webb & Whisk.
The door shut behind her.
The bell jingled.
The sound should not have felt final.
It did.
Crew turned toward the square.
Every phone lowered as if the owners had not been actively filming a woman’s emotional emergency.
Mrs. Bell cleared her throat near her bicycle.
Mason, the six-year-old who had yelled for a kiss because the internet had apparently raised him, looked deeply confused.
Mrs. Paxton stood at the gazebo steps with one hand covering her mouth.
Dotty was crying.
Actually crying.
Crew did not have the bandwidth for Dotty’s tears.
Mrs. Paxton approached him carefully.
“Crew—”
“No more posts.”
Her face tightened. “The video is already—”
“No more.”
It came out sharper than he intended.
Not loud.
But enough.
Mrs. Paxton stopped.
Crew dragged a hand over his jaw and forced his voice down.
“Please,” he said. “No more posts without Marin approving them.”
Mrs. Paxton looked at Webb & Whisk.
Her visor sat straight on her head now.
Less conspiracy.
More guilt.
“I got carried away,” she said.
“Yes.”
She flinched.
Crew did not apologize for that.
Some truths were not cruel just because they landed.
“I was thinking about the roof,” she said quietly. “And Tom. And all those donations. I thought if we kept the attention positive…” She stopped. “I forgot attention is not the same thing as kindness.”
Crew looked at the bakery window.
Through the glass, Marin stood behind the counter with her back to the square.
Talia was beside her.
Marin’s shoulders were straight.
Too straight.
“I forgot that once too,” Crew said.
Mrs. Paxton looked at him.
He did not explain.
He did not need to.
Three years ago, he had thought not telling Marin everything was kind. He had thought leaving cleanly would hurt less than making her watch him struggle. He had thought silence would spare her.
Really, silence had spared him.
That was the truth he hated most.
His phone buzzed.
His father.
Crew’s stomach tightened before he opened it.
Dad: Saw the video.
Of course he had.
Honeybrook news traveled faster than shame.
Crew waited for another bubble.
It came.
Dad: Come by when you can. Bring Marin if she wants. Don’t ask her if she doesn’t.
Crew read that twice.
Then a third time.
Don’t ask her if she doesn’t.
Tom Donnelly could still fit an entire moral education into eight words.
Crew typed:
Crew: I will.
Then:
Crew: I made it worse.
His father’s reply took longer.
Long enough for Mrs. Paxton to return to the gazebo.
Long enough for the crowd to begin breaking apart in uneasy clusters.
Long enough for Dotty to wipe her eyes and whisper something to Mrs. Bell.
Long enough for Crew to stand there looking at a bakery door and remembering the girl who used to meet him by the alley after closing with two slightly burnt cookies because she said the ugly ones deserved a home too.
Finally, his phone buzzed.
Dad: Then make your next choice better.
Crew closed his eyes.
Right.
Not fix everything.
Not erase it.
Not perform guilt in public until people clapped.
Make the next choice better.
He put the phone away and walked toward the bakery.
Talia appeared in the doorway before he reached it.
She must have been watching through the glass.
Of course she had.
Talia Webb-adjacent security operated at a level the federal government could envy.
“No,” she said.
Crew stopped on the sidewalk.
“I’m not coming in.”
“Good.”
“I need to say one thing.”
“She doesn’t need one more thing.”
That was fair.
Crew nodded.
Talia studied him through the half-open door.
A patriotic garland hung behind her, glittering aggressively.
“What?” she asked finally.
“Tell her I’ll handle the committee.”
Talia’s eyes narrowed. “That sounds suspiciously like managing.”
“I’ll handle my part of the committee,” Crew corrected.
“Better.”
“And the team.”
“Definitely your mess.”
“Yes.”
“And if she wants out, I’ll make sure everyone knows it was my fault.”
Talia’s expression shifted.
Not approval.
Not yet.
Possibly never.
But something less sharp.
“She already knows it was your fault.”
“I mean publicly.”
“The internet loves public male accountability,” Talia said. “Unfortunately.”
“I’m not doing it for the internet.”
“No,” she said after a second. “That’s the annoying part.”
Behind her, inside the bakery, Marin moved.
Crew saw only the edge of her profile.
She was wiping down the counter with violent precision.
Talia followed his gaze.
“Do not look at her like that through my body,” she said.
Crew looked back at Talia.
“Sorry.”
“You should be.”
“I am.”
“You are very good at sounding sorry.”
Crew took that hit too.
“I’m trying to become better at being sorry.”
Talia’s eyes held his.
That landed.
Good.
He wanted it to.
She leaned slightly against the doorframe.
“Chapter one of that journey is leaving now.”
Crew nodded once.
“Tell her—”
Talia’s eyebrows rose.
He stopped.
Right.
No messages through best friends that put weight on Marin.
No using Talia as a hallway into Marin’s life.
Better choice.
Crew changed course.
“Never mind.”
Talia watched him.
Then, very grudgingly, she said, “That was growth.”
“I hated it.”
“Most growth is hideous.”
The corner of his mouth moved.
“Thank you.”
“I did not compliment you.”
“Understood.”
She pointed at him. “And stop saying understood like an emotionally responsible robot. It’s making her twitch.”
Crew almost laughed.
That was dangerous, so he nodded instead.
Talia stepped back and closed the door.
The bell jingled again.
Crew stood on the sidewalk for one more second.
Then he turned and headed toward the veterans center.
If he could not fix the whole disaster, he could at least start where the damage had a roof.