CHAPTER 35
OPHELIA
The afternoon was soft and golden, the kind of Tennessee winter day that pretended it wasn’t one—chilly enough for a jacket, bright enough to make you forget.
Matty’s hand was warm in mine, his thumb tracing lazy circles against my skin as we walked down the sidewalk toward the row of coffee shops near campus. The world felt…quiet. Safe. Perfect, actually.
He was saying something about the playoffs, about practice that morning, but I wasn’t really hearing it. I was too caught up in the easy way his voice rumbled, the way people glanced at him as we passed—smiles, double takes, whispers—and how he never noticed any of it. He just looked at me.
And then I froze.
The air around me seemed to disappear.
“Ophelia?” Matty’s voice was gentle at first, confused. “What is it?”
I couldn’t answer. My stomach had dropped straight through the pavement.
Coming toward us at a brisk, stiff pace were my parents.
My mother’s posture was perfect as ever, her beige coat immaculate, her lips already curled up like everything she was seeing was shit. My father walked beside her, phone in hand, with the same distant half frown he wore whenever he wasn’t looking at numbers.
They hadn’t seen me yet.
But they would.
Matty followed my line of sight, his easy smile fading. “You know them?” he asked quietly.
I wanted the earth to just open up and swallow me whole.
I couldn’t move. Couldn’t breathe. My pulse roared in my ears. “They’re my parents,” I whispered right before my mother’s eyes locked on me.
Matty’s hand tightened around mine instinctively. I’d told him what my mother was demanding and of her threats to get me placed on medical leave.
He obviously hadn’t been happy about that.
“Ophelia.” My mother’s voice cut through the noise of passing students, steady and cold as ever. “We need to talk.”
Every muscle in my body screamed no.
“What are you doing here?” My voice sounded strange, too small, like it had gotten lost in my throat before it made it out.
“Don’t take that tone with us.” My mother’s brows arched. “We drove all this way to help you. I warned you what would happen if you didn’t cooperate, and look what you did. I got what, a day, before you were back to your nasty habits?”
“Don’t speak to her like that,” Matty growled.
It wasn’t a request. It was a warning.
My mother’s eyes snapped to him, startled, like she had just noticed him standing beside me. Maybe she hadn’t. Maybe she’d thought it was a random student walking near me because I couldn’t possibly have found someone to love me.
Matty stepped a little closer, just enough that I could feel the restrained fury radiating from him, his thumb still rubbing soothing circles against my hand even as the rest of him looked ready to tear someone apart.
“Matthew Adler,” my dad said after a second, as though he knew him, as though the whole world knew him because his face was plastered across game-day posters. “We were just—”
Matty’s gaze sliced through him like he didn’t exist. “If you say anything to upset her, we’ll be leaving,” he announced, ignoring my dad’s outstretched hand.
“She’s fine,” my mom said briskly, her chin lifting like she was staking claim over me. “We’re her parents. We’re handling it.”
“Doesn’t look like you’re handling it,” Matty said flatly.
My mom’s lips pressed together in a thin, white line. “You don’t know what you’re talking about. You don’t know her.”
“Hmm. Is that so?” His voice went low, dangerous.
My mother scoffed. “She’s been diagnosed,” my mom said, like she had some kind of trump card.
“I’m sure she didn't tell you. She’s been diagnosed with obsessive love disorder, obsessive-compulsive disorder, borderline personality disorder, and an attachment disorder.
Do you understand what that means? She doesn’t feel things the way other people do. She’s sick.”
The words cut me open, even after hearing her say them for what must have been the millionth time. I wanted to crawl into the pavement and disappear into the cracks.
For one endless heartbeat, Matty just stared at them. The silence stretched.
“With absolutely no due respect, fuck off,” Matty finally said calmly, wrapping his arms all the way around me and pulling my back to his chest.
“Excuse me?” my mother said, aghast.
“You don’t get to decide what she feels,” he snarled. “You don’t get to tell me what this is. I don’t give a damn what you call it in some office. What we have is real. You think it’s obsession? Fine. Then I’m obsessed with her right back.”
I stared up at him in awe.
Matty wasn’t looking at me, though; he was staring them down like he’d never lost a battle in his life and wasn’t about to start now.
“You want to talk about symptoms? Here’s one for you.
I memorize the way she looks at me. I keep hearing her voice in my head when she’s not around.
I notice her before I notice anything else.
I can’t not. She’s under my skin. She’s in my lungs. I couldn’t get her out if I tried.”
My dad’s face paled. “Son, you don’t know what you’re saying.”
“The hell I don’t.” Matty’s voice cracked like thunder. “I’m saying I choose her. Every broken piece, every diagnosis, everything you want to write off as sickness. She’s mine. And I’m hers.”
My throat closed, heat surging behind my eyes, because no one—no one—had ever said that for me. Not to my parents. Not against the weight of what they believed about me.
My mom shook her head, almost pitying him now. “You’ll regret this. You don’t know how bad it gets.”
Matty turned his head slowly toward her, a humorless smile curving his mouth. “Oh, I know exactly how bad it gets,” he said quietly.
My mother blinked. “What do you mean?”
“I’ve seen her school file,” Matty said, disgust creeping into his voice.
“And you know what I didn’t see? I didn’t see a single restriction.
Nothing saying the campus was monitoring her or that they thought she was a danger.
Nothing saying she couldn’t live her life or do anything but be a regular college student. ”
I stared at my parents in shock. Tears burned at the corners of my eyes, and spilled down my cheeks. My throat went tight. All these months of worrying, of jumping through her hoops.
And none of it had been real?
“You made it all up,” Matty said, each word angrier than the last. “You lied to her. You scared her. You used her medical record like a leash because it made you feel powerful.”
He glanced between them, his expression pure hate. “Which means you’re not just bad parents—you’re conniving little assholes.”
My mother’s breath hitched, like he’d slapped her. My father’s face flushed an ugly red. They both stared at Matty like they were seeing someone unhinged.
“And if you want a diagnosis…because the two of you seem to love them so much…I’ve got one for you.
She’s mine.” Matty bared his teeth in something that wasn’t a smile.
“Write it down. Stamp it across my forehead. Because I won’t stop thinking about her.
I don’t want to. She’s in my head when I wake up.
She’s under my skin when I try to sleep.
She’s it for me. And you’re out of your damn minds if you think I’m letting you hurt her ever again. ”
My knees nearly gave out. My heart pounded so violently I thought he’d feel it through his chest.
My mom’s face softened into pity again, her eyes glistening. “Oh, Matthew. You’ll destroy yourself trying to hold her up.”
He shook his head slowly, never looking away from her.
“You’ve got it wrong. She doesn’t drag me down.
She makes me stronger. You see her as fragile?
I don’t. I see a girl who survived everything you threw at her and still finds a way to stand here breathing.
You think that’s sickness? I think it’s the bravest damn thing I’ve ever seen. ”
My breath caught, a sob clawing at my throat. I loved him so much.
“Get out of here,” Matty ordered. “You’re not welcome. Not until she says you are.”
My mother’s mouth opened, trembling around words she didn’t quite know how to form. “Ophelia,” she said softly, in that tone she used when she wanted to sound gentle but was really just trying to manipulate. “We were just trying to help.”
Something inside me snapped cleanly into place.
I lifted my middle fingers, both of them, right there on the sidewalk. “Consider me helped,” I said, my voice shaking—but not from fear this time.
Matty huffed out a quiet, disbelieving laugh beside me, the kind that sounded proud and wrecked all at once. Then he laced his fingers through mine, and we started walking.
We didn’t look back.
I stirred the pot, the smell of chicken and garlic thick in the air as I made Matty’s favorite…chicken noodle soup.
And for once I didn’t have to feel guilty for doing it.
Riley sat on the counter, legs swinging, her blonde hair pulled into a messy bun that somehow still looked perfect. She was scrolling on her phone with one hand, sipping iced coffee with the other.
“That smells so good,” she said. “You’re going to let me have some, right?”
“Of course,” I said shyly. I was still getting used to the fact that I now had three roommates...and that they wanted to hang out with me. I smiled a little, tucking a strand of hair behind my ear. “It’s Matty’s favorite. His mom used to make it before every big game in high school.”
Riley grinned. “That’s adorable. It’s nice having someone in the house who can cook.”
I laughed softly and turned to the cabinet above the stove. “He said he likes a ton of pepper, so I’m just going to—”
The second I opened it, a dozen orange pill bottles tumbled out like hail. They clattered across the counter, a few bouncing onto the tile floor and rolling under the island.
“Oh my gosh,” Riley squeaked, diving forward. “I’m so sorry! I didn’t put that away very well.”
She crouched to scoop them up, muttering under her breath as she gathered the bottles into her arms.