Chapter Six #3
“Sorry.”
She looked at the street.
“I hate that your dad is tired.”
Crew’s throat tightened.
“Me too.”
“I hate that people keep turning it into content.”
“Me too.”
“I hate that this fundraiser is working.”
He nodded.
“Me too.”
“And I hate that you’re being…” She waved one hand vaguely. “Decent.”
Crew’s mouth moved despite himself.
“Decent?”
“Don’t fish.”
“I’m not.”
“You have a fishing face.”
“I have one face.”
“You have many faces. Unfortunately, I remember all of them.”
That landed between them.
Softer than before.
More dangerous.
Crew did not move.
Marin realized what she had said at the same time he did.
Her cheeks colored faintly.
She looked away.
Good.
No.
Not good.
He wanted to step closer.
He wanted to ask what she remembered.
He wanted to tell her he remembered everything too.
The blue dress from senior awards night.
The scar on her knee from falling off the bakery’s back steps.
The way she hated loud fireworks but loved the quiet sparkle after.
The way she cried when angry and got angrier because of it.
The way she used to say his name in the dark like it was safe.
He said none of it.
Better choice.
The door opened behind them.
Tom stood there.
Without permission.
Without supervision.
Naturally.
“Dad,” Crew said.
Tom lifted a hand. “Before you both yell, I am standing in a doorway, not climbing Everest.”
Marin turned. “You were told to sit.”
“I was told to rest. Spiritually, I am resting.”
“That is not how bodies work.”
Tom looked at Crew. “She always this mean when scared?”
Crew glanced at Marin.
Marin glared at Tom.
Tom smiled.
“Yes,” Crew said.
Marin pointed at both of them. “I am surrounded by Donnelly men with survival instincts made of wet cardboard.”
Tom laughed.
Then winced a little.
Crew’s humor vanished.
Marin saw it too.
She stepped forward.
“Inside,” she said.
Tom obeyed.
Immediately.
Crew followed, but his phone buzzed before he reached the door.
He checked it.
The Spitfires group chat.
For once, only one message.
From Wilder.
Wilder: Not posting. Not commenting. Just checking: is your dad okay?
Crew stared at it.
Then typed:
Crew: He’s okay enough for today.
Wilder replied:
Wilder: That sounds heavy.
Crew: It is.
Wilder: Want us there for the Fourth? Quietly. Not content. Just team.
Crew stopped walking.
Team.
The word hit differently now.
He had spent years being captain. Responsible. Steady. The one who carried things before anyone asked. But this team had become something messier than responsibility.
Family.
Emotionally unsupervised, yes.
But family.
Crew looked through the veterans center doorway.
Marin was helping Tom sit again, scolding him under her breath while he smiled like a man being loved exactly how he deserved.
Crew typed back:
Crew: Yes.
Then, after a second:
Crew: Quietly.
Wilder responded:
Wilder: Define quietly.
Crew closed his eyes.
Then his phone buzzed with another message.
Sutton: I’ll handle it.
Better.
He put the phone away and went inside.
By late morning, Tom had eaten enough to satisfy Marin’s command requirements, Eddie’s anxiety, and the three hovering veterans. Crew drove him home, with Marin following in her own car after Talia dropped it off at the center and then vanished back to the bakery muttering about apron logistics.
Tom’s house sat at the edge of Honeybrook on a quiet street shaded by old maples. Crew had grown up there. White siding. Green shutters. Front porch that sagged slightly on the left because Tom refused to replace boards he could repair one more time.
Marin had grown up in that house too, in a way.
Not living there.
But present.
At the kitchen table. On the porch steps. In the backyard during cookouts. Curled in the den with Crew while his father pretended not to notice their knees touching.
She parked behind him and got out with a paper bag from the bakery.
Crew looked at it.
“Did you bring food?”
“Yes.”
“When?”
“I am efficient.”
“She is bossy,” Tom said from the passenger seat.
Marin opened his door. “You are currently being kept alive by bossy women and peanut butter crackers. Show gratitude.”
Tom looked at Crew. “See?”
Crew smiled faintly. “I see.”
They got Tom inside and settled in his recliner with water, a sandwich, and instructions he pretended to resent. Marin moved through the kitchen like she remembered where everything was.
Because she did.
Crew stood near the counter and watched her pull a plate from the cabinet above the dishwasher.
Same cabinet.
Same reach.
Same Marin.
Different world.
She froze with the plate in her hand.
He knew she felt it too.
The memory.
How many times had they stood in this kitchen?
Sneaking snacks after games. Cleaning up after dinners.
Arguing over music. Kissing once against the refrigerator when Tom was outside grilling, and Crew had pulled away first because he was trying to be respectful and Marin had whispered, “Respect me less for fifteen seconds.”
Crew looked away.
Immediately.
Too late.
Marin set the plate down harder than necessary.
From the living room, Tom called, “I can hear the silence.”
Marin closed her eyes.
Crew stared at the sink.
Tom continued, “Silence is never good with you two. It usually means kissing or fighting.”
“Dad,” Crew said.
Marin muttered, “I cannot believe I was worried about him.”
Tom laughed from the recliner.
Crew risked looking at her.
She was looking back.
Her cheeks were pink.
His chest hurt.
Not guilt this time.
Want.
Old and new.
Simple and impossible.
Marin cleared her throat and grabbed the sandwich.
“I’m taking this to your father.”
“Good idea.”
“Stop having a voice.”
“I’ll try.”
She pointed the sandwich at him. “That one doesn’t count because it’s your natural voice.”
“I’ll change voices.”
“Don’t. That would be worse.”
She walked out.
Crew gripped the counter and told himself to breathe like a normal person.
He had faced national broadcasts with less pressure than Marin Webb remembering a refrigerator.
His phone buzzed.
Again.
This time, it was Mrs. Paxton.
Mrs. Paxton: Small update: Channel Seven used Marin’s audio statement and linked the donation page. Roof fund is now at 72%. Also apron batch three?
Crew stared at the message.
Seventy-two percent.
The number landed hard.
Good.
Painful.
Good.
He walked into the living room.
Tom was in the recliner, eating his sandwich under Marin’s supervision. She stood beside the side table, arms crossed.
Crew held up his phone.
“Roof fund is at seventy-two percent.”
Tom stopped chewing.
Marin’s face changed.
Mrs. Paxton’s chaos. Dotty’s posts. Wilder’s mistake. The apron. The cupcakes. The comments. The interviews. The uncomfortable public mess of them.
It was working.
The roof might actually get fixed.
Tom looked down at his sandwich.
For a second, Crew thought he might cry.
Tom Donnelly did not cry often.
When he did, he hid it badly and claimed allergies.
He cleared his throat.
“That so?”
Crew nodded.
“Yes.”
Marin’s eyes shone.
She looked away.
Tom looked at her.
“You did that, kid.”
She shook her head immediately.
“The town did.”
“Mm-hmm.”
“The cupcakes helped.”
“Sure.”
“And Captain Problem apparently has commercial value.”
Tom’s mouth twitched.
Crew looked at her.
Marin looked back.
A smile tugged at her mouth.
Small.
Real.
For him.
Maybe not for him.
Maybe just because life was absurd and she was tired.
He accepted it anyway.
Then Tom said, “Looks like you two make a good team.”
The smile vanished.
Crew closed his eyes.
Marin inhaled.
Tom looked between them.
“What?”
“Dad,” Crew said.
“What? I said team. Not couple. I am a retired Marine, not Dotty.”
Marin pressed her lips together.
Crew could tell she did not want to laugh.
Then she did.
Once.
Small and unwilling.
Crew smiled because he could not help it.
Marin saw.
Her laughter faded, but not completely.
For one brief second, they stood in Tom’s living room smiling at the same ridiculous thing.
Not public.
Not staged.
Not content.
Just them.
Then Marin’s phone rang.
She looked at the screen.
Her face changed.
Crew’s smile disappeared.
“What is it?” he asked.
She did not answer right away.
The phone kept ringing.
Tom sat forward slightly.
“Marin?”
She turned the screen enough for Crew to see.
Her mother.
That alone should not have made her look like that.
She answered.
“Mom?”
A pause.
Then Marin’s face went pale.
Crew stepped toward her before he could stop himself.
She did not move away.
“What?” she said into the phone. “No, slow down. What happened?”
Crew’s body went cold.
Tom’s sandwich sat forgotten on the plate.
Marin listened, one hand pressed to her stomach.
Then she closed her eyes.
“Okay,” she whispered. “I’m coming.”
She ended the call.
Crew waited.
Every instinct in him screamed to ask, move, fix.
He forced himself still.
Marin looked at him.
Not Tom.
Him.
For one impossible second, she looked like she had three years ago when something went wrong and Crew was the person she reached for before thinking.
“My bakery,” she said.
Crew’s heart slammed.
“What happened?”
Her voice shook.
“There’s water coming through the ceiling in the back kitchen.”
Tom swore softly.
Crew grabbed his keys.
Marin was already moving.
“I have to go.”
“I’ll drive,” Crew said.
She stopped in the doorway.
The old Marin would have argued.
This Marin looked at him, scared and furious and calculating minutes against damage.
Then she nodded.
“Fast,” she said.
“Not stupid,” he answered.
She swallowed.
“Good.”
They ran for the truck.
And Crew understood with awful clarity that the day was not done taking things apart.