Chapter 8
EIGHT
KENDRICK
I don’t sleep.
I drift for an hour at most, half-dreaming of water and her hands and the way she’d whispered my name against my skin — but every time I start to fall deeper, my body jolts awake like it’s remembering she’s not there.
When the sun finally edges through the curtains, pale and cold, I give up.
I throw on a shirt, find my boots, and wander into the kitchen where Gran is already stirring a pot on the stove.
She doesn’t look at me at first. She doesn’t have to.
“You’re pacing,” she says, which is impressive considering I haven’t moved more than five steps since entering the room.
“I’m not pacing.”
“You are,” she repeats, tapping the spoon gently against the pot. “Has something got you twisted up?”
“No.”
She hums — the kind of hum that means she absolutely doesn’t believe me.
I open the fridge. Close the fridge. Shift my weight. Exhale too sharply.
Gran turns, leaning on the counter with her elbows. “Is this about the photographer?”
I freeze. “No.”
“That’s a shame,” she says. “You seemed lighter yesterday. Happier.”
“I’m always the same amount of happy.”
She gives me a dry look. “You came home last night looking like your heart had been wrung out and hung up to dry.”
“That’s dramatic.”
“True, though.”
I scrub a hand over my jaw. My chest feels too warm and too tight at the same time.
“You want coffee?” Gran asks, softening her voice.
“Sure.”
She pours a mug and sets it on the table, patting the chair beside her. “Sit.”
I sit.
She studies me with those sharp eyes that miss nothing. “Talk.”
“There’s nothing to talk about.”
“Kendrick,” she says gently, “if you liked this girl less, you’d be much calmer.”
I open my mouth to argue, but the words tangle before they can form.
I don’t like her. Not in the way Gran means.
Except I do.
More than I meant to.
More than makes sense.
Gran touches my wrist, a small, grounding gesture. “Some things,” she says, “you can’t outwork or outrun. You just have to feel them.”
I stare down into my coffee.
I’m not good at this — the open-chested, vulnerable stuff. I don’t let people in easily. But Emma… she slipped through like she didn’t know she wasn’t supposed to.
“I’m going to check on her,” I say finally.
Gran nods like she’s been waiting for me to figure that out. “Go on, then.”
The walk to her cabin shouldn’t make my pulse thrum the way it does. It’s early, quiet, the air crisp enough to sting my lungs. I tell myself she’s probably just asleep. Or editing photos. Or baking muffins again to distract herself.
But something unsettled curls low in my gut as I approach her steps.
Her car is parked exactly where it was yesterday.
But the cabin feels… still.
Not empty — just still.
I knock.
No answer.
I knock again, harder. “Emma?”
Nothing.
My heart sinks a fraction as I test the door. It’s unlocked.
“Emma,” I call softly. “You in here?”
The living room is neat. Too neat. Her coat isn’t draped over the chair the way it was last night. Her boots aren’t by the rug. The leftover fry bread wrappers we joked about aren’t on the counter anymore.
I step inside, my chest tightening.
“Emma?”
Silence.
Then I see it.
On the table sits a single piece of paper, weighted by something small and silver.
Her earring.
I reach for the note first. My throat tightens the second I read her handwriting.
Thank you for showing me what home feels like.
That’s it. No explanation. No apology. No promise.
Just that one, clean line that punches straight through me.
My gaze drops to the object beneath the note — the photo I didn’t know she printed. The one she took on the ridge.
Me, standing beneath the aurora, the green light bending around me like it’s part of the moment, not the backdrop. My expression softer than I ever let it be. My guard down in a way I didn’t realize she’d captured.
I sit heavily on the edge of the couch, the photo in my hands, the note burning in my head.
She’s gone.
She didn’t say where. Didn’t ask for anything. Didn’t leave anything unfinished except me.
I breathe out slowly, the sound raw in my throat.
Of course she left. Her life isn’t here. She has a future somewhere bigger, brighter, more ambitious than this small town and the firefighter stupid enough to fall for the way she looks at the world.
Still — I wanted more time. I wanted one more morning. I wanted her to stay long enough to see what we could’ve been if neither of us were afraid of wanting too much.
I press the photo lightly against my knee, jaw tight.
“Emma,” I whisper, the word breaking a little.
I don’t know if I’m angry or hurt or numb.
But I know one thing for sure: I’m not going to forget her.
Not today, not next week, not ever.
I look at the photo again. Then I stand, walk to my bedroom, and tack it to the wall above my bed.
Let it stay there. Let it remind me what it felt like — for one night — to be seen in a way I didn’t know I needed.