56. Eden
EDEN
Istared at my phone for the sixth time in ten minutes.
Her name was still at the top of my chats because I couldn’t bring myself to unpin her.
I locked the screen again and tossed the phone face down on my bed. Then immediately regretted it and picked it back up.
This was pathetic.
I wasn’t supposed to still be stuck here, waiting, hoping, checking my phone like some idiot teenager who couldn’t move on. I wasn’t supposed to be this messed up over someone who chose to walk away.
But I was.
Because it wasn’t just anyone. It was Alana.
All I had to do was send her one quick text, and maybe she’d come back. Maybe she was just trying to figure out a way to reach out but simply didn’t know what to say.
I ran my hands through my hair and leaned back against the headboard.
My room looked the same as it always did—same wall of trophies from a life I didn’t care about anymore.
Same faded posters, same shelves packed with books I never read.
But everything felt different. Like the silence was louder now.
Like the air was missing something important.
I thought about texting her. Just something small. “Hey.” Or maybe “Hope you’re okay.” Even “I miss you,” if I let my guard down enough to admit it.
But every time I started typing something, I deleted it before I could hit send.
She made it clear that she didn’t want to have anything to do with me.
And I didn’t want to be the guy who kept showing up when he wasn’t wanted.
Still, part of me kept replaying that night in her apartment over and over. The way she looked at me like I’d shattered everything. The things she said. The way she didn’t even flinch when I told her I loved her.
It made me feel like a fucking fool.
I couldn’t even tell if I was mad at her or just heartbroken.
Maybe both.
I sighed, let my head fall back against the wall, and closed my eyes. Just for a second.
Then there was a knock downstairs.
I froze.
It was late. Too late for deliveries and my parents were out helping Brooke set up for tomorrow. My siblings were probably at some party. No one was supposed to be here. Everyone else had a key.
The knock came again.
I pushed myself up slowly and padded down the stairs, heart in my throat for reasons I didn’t want to name.
When I opened the door, I didn’t expect to see her. Standing on my porch like a ghost I’d spent weeks trying to forget.
She looked tired. Not in the “long day” kind of way, but like sleep hadn’t found her in a while. Her hair was pulled up like she didn’t bother to fix it. She had no makeup on. No armor.
Just Alana.
Raw and real and completely wrecked.
For a second, neither of us said anything.
And I couldn’t breathe either.
“Hey,” she said eventually, softly.
“Hey.”
Alana looked down at her shoes. “Can I come in?”
I stepped aside, and she walked in slow, careful like she didn’t want to take up too much space. Like she wasn’t sure she should’ve come here.
I closed the door behind her and leaned against it.
“I’ve been meaning to do this for a while,” she said, turning to face me. “But I kept… chickening out.”
I said nothing. I was too scared if I spoke, it would break the moment.
To be honest, part of me wasn’t sure she was even real. I mean, it had been weeks and there was no way she would’ve shown up at my parents’ place out of the blue.
Shit, was I hallucinating?
Alana took a shaky breath and looked me dead in the eyes.
“I was afraid,” she admitted. “That if I let my feelings win—if I let us win—we’d fall again. I’m so used to everything going wrong in my life that I couldn’t believe the one thing that felt good. It was too good to be true, so I ruined it before it could ruin me.”
My throat tightened, but I stayed quiet. Let her speak.
“I was wrong for that. And you didn’t deserve it. Any of it.” Her voice cracked a little. “I’m just… I don’t know. Stupid, maybe. Or scared. I’ve spent so long doing everything on my own that the idea of trusting someone felt impossible.”
“But I thought you trusted me,” I finally spoke, feeling as my heart sank a little deeper. Maybe I didn’t want to talk to her after all. As it seemed, I was only going to get hurt even more.
“I did,” she said quickly, almost panicky. “I do trust you, Eden.”
“It doesn’t sound like it.”
Alana sighed. “I know. God, I’m just not good at this.
” She covered her face with both of her hands for a moment, taking a few quick breaths before blowing out some air and settling her gaze back on me.
“Look, I don’t want to make excuses for what I said because nothing could ever make it okay.
I was being a brat when I said what I did.
I know you’re nothing like Tori said. Even when she published that article, I knew you didn’t do what she claimed you did. ”
I nodded cautiously, unsure of what I was supposed to do at that very moment. “But?”
“I’m used to having nobody but myself to rely on.
You frightened me. The attention you gave me, the honesty, and all those things you said.
You meant well, I know that. But it scared the shit out of me,” she told me, tears in her eyes.
“I told myself that you were just playing with me. You know that I never thought of myself as someone who was worth being loved. So when you showed me otherwise, it scared me. I got so used to you being there for me that I couldn’t help but end it once the smallest window for me to run opened.
Because if I stayed and you didn’t like me the way I hoped you did, I was going to get hurt.
Again. I was trying to protect myself, but instead I tortured myself.
The worst part, though, was hurting you. ”
I wanted to step closer, cup her face with my hands and tell her that it was fine. I wanted to tell her that I loved her and that it was okay. That I knew she didn’t think too good of herself. That I knew she couldn’t believe I loved her. But I was willing to fight that problem with her.
But I couldn’t just yet.
Alana’s eyes closed for a second, then fluttered right back open.
“I thought I was doing the right thing for the both of us, but I was wrong. So wrong, and I am so, so sorry for that. I’m so sorry for everything I put you through.
And I know I don’t deserve your forgiveness or a second chance, but I’m still hoping that maybe one day, you will forgive me.
But even if we never get a second chance, I need you to know that I’m sorry and that I love you. ”
My heart stopped.
My lungs forgot how to work. For a second, the room seemed to tilt, the air suddenly thin. “W-What?”
“I love you,” she repeated. “I’ve loved you for a while, actually.”
My fingers curled at my sides, nails digging into my palms as if the sting might ground me. I stared at her, searching her face for the slightest hint of lies—some sign that I’d misheard, that this was another misunderstanding.
But there wasn’t one.
Alana loved me.
After everything. After the nights I’d spent replaying every word between us, wondering where it had all gone wrong. After the anger, the confusion, the hollow ache I’d carried around like a second heartbeat.
And now she was standing in front of me, saying the one thing I’d convinced myself I would never hear.
It felt like a dream.
Before I could even begin to wrap my mind around it, she continued to ramble. “I know this might be too late, and like I said, you don’t have to forgive me. I just wanted you to know.”
“Okay,” I said in a breath, though I had so much more to say.
“You know, for a moment, I thought being with you felt like jumping off a cliff with no way to escape. The only direction I could see was down. But even if it’s only going down, you still deserve that apology and my truth.”
I swallowed hard. The hurt in her voice made my chest ache.
Finally, I stepped closer, just enough to see her properly, to look past the fear and guilt in her eyes.
For just a moment I couldn’t care less about an apology. I didn’t want one. And, alright, that was probably wrong of me, but all I wanted was her back.
She was here. She was at least trying to fight. It was more than I was willing to do.
“What if it wasn’t?” I asked quietly.
She blinked. “Wasn’t what?”
“What if it wasn’t down?” My heart was pounding, but I didn’t stop. “What if it felt like falling because we were supposed to? But what if we weren’t crashing?”
She stared at me.
“What if we soar?” I asked.
The air shifted. Her lips parted just slightly, like the words caught her off guard.
Tears filled her eyes then, but she smiled like no one had ever said something more beautiful to her before. Which was a lie, I said much better things before.
I reached for her hand. She let me.
I laced our fingers together and gave her hand a light squeeze.
“I was hurting, Alana,” I said. “I thought you didn’t believe in me. In us. I thought you gave up.”
“I did,” she whispered. “But only because I thought it would break me to believe in something that might leave me again.”
“I never wanted to leave. You pushed me away.”
“I know,” she said. “And I’ll be sorry for that every day, but I want to be better. I want to be brave enough to believe in the good things now. In you. In us.”
I pulled her into me before she could say anything else. Held her like she was mine again.
Because she was.
Maybe this time we’d get it right.
Maybe this time, we wouldn’t fall.
Maybe this time… we’d soar.