Chapter 26
ETHAN
It was cold when I left. One of those mid-October rains that soaks straight through your sweatshirt and settles into your bones. The streets were slick and shining, the city muted and gray, steam curling up from grates like the place itself was exhaling.
I was halfway home, earbuds in, hood up, when something made me stop.
Not a sound.
A feeling.
I looked up.
She was standing on the sidewalk across the street.
No umbrella.
Hair plastered to her shoulders, rain-dark and dripping.
Thin jacket soaked through, clinging to her like it had been painted on.
Cheeks flushed from the cold, eyes too bright.
For one impossible second, my body reacted before my mind did.
Pure instinct.
A lightning bolt of want so sharp it almost stole my breath.
God.
She looked exactly the way she always did when she caught me off guard—beautiful in that way that felt like it belonged to me and terrified me at the same time.
Then memory hit.
The fights.
The shouting.
The way my chest used to tighten when I heard her key in the lock.
The way love with her always came with a cost I didn’t realize until I was already paying it.
I stood there, frozen.
She saw me.
Her face changed instantly—shock first, then relief, then something desperate and hopeful that made my throat close.
“Ethan,” she said, like my name was a prayer she’d been holding in.
She didn’t wait for me to answer.
She crossed the street fast, shoes slipping slightly on the wet pavement, breath coming hard. When she reached me, she stopped short, like she wasn’t sure she was allowed to touch me anymore.
Up close, she smelled like rain and soap and something achingly familiar.
“I didn’t know if you’d be here,” she said. “I—I walked by your place first.”
My chest felt tight. Too tight.
“You shouldn’t be out in this,” I said, and hated myself for how gentle it sounded.
She laughed softly, the sound brittle. “You always say that.”
Silence fell between us, heavy and charged.
Her eyes searched my face like she was looking for permission. Or forgiveness. Or both.
“I sent you an email,” she said quietly.
“I read it.”
Her breath caught.
“And?”
I didn’t answer.
Because the truth was complicated.
Because standing here with her, soaked and shaking and beautiful, made it feel like the universe was nudging me toward a mistake I already knew too well.
“I meant it,” she said quickly, words tumbling out now. “All of it. About trying again. About not letting fear win. The world is—God, it’s so broken right now. And I just keep thinking—what if we’re wasting time?”
Rain ran down her lashes like tears she refused to shed.
“I know I messed up,” she whispered. “I know I hurt you. But I loved you. I still love you.”
There it was.
The thing that always undid me.
Need.
Love.
Want.
All wrapped together and aimed straight at my chest.
She took a step closer.
I should’ve stepped back.
I didn’t.
Her hands fisted lightly in the front of my sweatshirt like she was anchoring herself. Like she was afraid I might disappear if she let go.
“Tell me to go,” she said. “If that’s what you want. Just—tell me to go.”
I opened my mouth.
Nothing came out.
Because the truth was, I didn’t want her gone.
I wanted her the way you want fire when you’re cold—knowing full well it can burn the house down if you’re not careful.
She leaned in, tentative at first, giving me time to stop her.
I didn’t.
Our mouths met, soft and unsure, rain and breath and memory colliding between us. The kiss deepened instinctively, bodies remembering what our minds tried to forget.
Her hands slid up my neck.
Mine found her waist.
The city blurred around us—the rain, the traffic, the distant sirens—all of it fading until there was only this.
Us.
When we finally broke apart, she rested her forehead against my chest, breathing hard.
“I missed you,” she said.
I closed my eyes.
So had I.
That was the problem.
Because love with her was never simple.
It was beautiful.
And intoxicating.
And dangerous.
And standing there in the rain, holding her while the world still reeled from loss, I knew—deep down—that this moment wasn’t a beginning.
It was a choice.
And whatever I chose next would change everything.
We pull apart, barely.
My heart is hammering so hard I can feel it in my throat. She’s stolen my breath again, like she always did, like she always would if I let her. Rain slides down her temples, clings to the curve of her jaw, gathers at her lashes until she’s blinking hard, eyes glassy and bright and wrecked.
“I love you,” she whispers, like it’s a secret meant only for my skin. “I never stopped. I don’t know how to.”
Her fingers slide into my hair, nails scraping lightly against my scalp, and the sensation shoots straight through me — familiar, addictive, deadly. She pulls, not hard, just enough to tip my mouth back to hers.
I should stop her.
I don’t.
Her lips find mine again, more desperate this time, less careful. Her mouth opens and her tongue brushes mine, heat and insistence and memory colliding all at once. I groan into her kiss before I can stop myself, the sound torn out of me like a confession.
God.
She’s always known how to undo me.
I hiss when her tongue presses harder, when her body fits against mine like it was made for this exact moment. My hands come up without permission, settling at her waist, feeling the slick cold of rain-soaked fabric and the unmistakable warmth beneath it.
This is the trap.
I know it even as I sink into it.
Every kiss with her is a promise and a threat wrapped together — all heat, all want, no safety net. My mind flashes through the nights that followed moments just like this. The fights. The apologies. The way love with her always burned hotter than it should.
But standing here, soaked and shaking, I want it anyway.
I want this bad love to work so badly it hurts.
I kiss her back like it might rewrite the past, like if I just want it hard enough, it’ll be different this time. Like the world didn’t just fall apart, like we didn’t already break each other once.
She sighs against my mouth, a soft, satisfied sound that goes straight to my chest. Her hands tighten in my hair, holding me there, claiming me like she’s already won.
And maybe she has.
Because even as a small, rational voice in my head whispers this is how it starts, all I can think is how alive she makes me feel — how empty everything else felt without her.
The rain keeps falling.
And I stay.
We stayed like that for a long second.
Rain pouring down.
Breath tangled.
Foreheads almost touching.
The world narrowed to the space between our mouths.
She was the first to speak.
“Can I come in?” she whispered.
Not needy.
Not manipulative.
Just… small.
Hopeful.
And that almost broke me more than anything else she’d ever done.
Because I wanted to say yes.
God, I wanted to.
I wanted her in my bed, in my arms, in that familiar dangerous orbit where everything felt intense and meaningful and wrong in exactly the ways that used to feel like love.
But I’d learned something.
Not enough.
Just enough.
“Not tonight,” I said quietly.
Her eyes flicked up to mine, searching for rejection.
I shook my head. “Not like this.”
The words surprised both of us.
She swallowed. “You don’t want me?”
“I do,” I said, honest. “That’s the problem.”
For a heartbeat, she looked like she might cry.
Then she nodded.
Once.
Like she understood more than she wanted to.
The rain came down harder, suddenly, drenching us both.
I took her hand.
Not pulling her toward my door.
Pulling her away from it.
“Come on,” I said.
We ran.
Laughing despite ourselves, splashing through puddles, breathless and ridiculous, two soaked adults sprinting down a city block like kids escaping a storm.
We ducked under a bus stop awning just as the rain turned into a full downpour.
The world roared around us.
We stood there, chest to chest, hands still locked, dripping onto the concrete.
For a minute, neither of us spoke.
She leaned her head against my shoulder.
Not seductive.
Not strategic.
Just tired.
Just human.
“I was scared you’d tell me to go,” she said.
“I almost did.”
She huffed a small, sad laugh. “That bad?”
“That dangerous,” I corrected.
Silence.
Her fingers tightened around mine.
“I’m not trying to trap you,” she said softly. “I just… I didn’t want to be alone tonight.”
That, more than the kissing, made my chest ache.
I stepped out into the rain, arm still linked with hers, scanning the street.
A taxi came through the light.
I raised my hand.
It slowed.
Stopped.
I opened the back door for her.
She hesitated, looking up at me.
“You’re not coming?” she asked.
I surprised myself.
“I am.”
Her eyebrows lifted.
I slid in beside her, closing the door on the rain and the noise and the night.
The cab smelled like vinyl and wet coats.
“Where to?” the driver asked.
She gave her address.
The cab pulls away, windshield wipers beating time while the city blurs into streaks of light and shadow. Sage stares out the window, chewing on her lower lip, fingers twisted together in her lap.
I watch the meter tick up and feel something in my chest tighten.
When the cab finally slows, it’s not a brownstone. We stop in front of a narrow building squeezed between a nail salon and a Chinese takeout place. Neon flickers in the window below. A hand-painted menu taped crookedly to the glass.
Third floor. Walk-up.
The driver pops the locks. Rain drums harder now.
She doesn’t move right away.
Then, quietly, like she’s confessing something small but fatal, she says, “It was Chloe’s place. I brought you there because I was embarrassed.”
I turn toward her.
“All summer,” she adds, eyes fixed on the rain-slicked sidewalk. “I didn’t want you to see this.”
Something in her voice dares me to make it matter.
I shake my head once. “Sh… it doesn’t matter now.”
And I mean it — mostly.
But it’s still a lie.
Because it does matter.
Not the apartment. Not the stairs. Not the flickering neon or the smell of lo mein drifting up through the rain.
It’s the pattern.
Another omission.
Another version of the truth held back until it’s unavoidable.
Another layer peeled away too late.
She bites her lip again, harder this time, like she’s waiting for me to say more.
I don’t.
I pay the driver. Step out into the rain. Walk her to the door without touching her, the space between us heavy and deliberate.
She looks up at me under the awning, eyes searching, hopeful in that way that still guts me.
“Thank you,” she says.
“For the cab,” I reply.
She nods, like she hears everything I’m not saying.
When the door closes behind her and the lock clicks, I stand there a moment longer than necessary, rain soaking through to my skin.
This is how it happens, I think.
Not with screaming.
Not with betrayal you can point to.
With small lies.
Soft ones.
The kind that don’t push you away all at once — just keep you from ever moving closer again.
I walk back to the street alone, hailing another cab, already pulling farther away than she realizes.