26
VASSO
Dillinger Island lighthouse, first light
Dawn climbsthe lighthouse tower like it’s earning every rung back.
The lantern room still smells of sea salt and machine oil; the glass is cold under my palm, the sea below restless as a heart that hasn’t earned gentleness.
Naomi stands in the spill of the first beam with the wind in her hair and her coat belted tight, eyes bright the way priceless things are bright.
“I asked them to switch her on early,” she says, quiet. “I wanted the light… awake when we were.”
For a second, the boy who raked leaves outside this lighthouse and snuck in to kiss the most beautiful girl in the work looks through my eyes. Then I make room for the man who owns the deed and, God help me, wants to deserve it.
She turns to me, chin lifted, hands steady at her sides. “I owe you an explanation,” she says.
The word lands like something set carefully on a table.
“I repeated the worst part of us,” she goes on, voice soft but unflinching. “I chose alone. I decided for both of us because fear wears my father’s cologne and sometimes I can’t tell the difference between his shadow and a storm cloud. I’m done with that. I’m done choosing alone.”
The beam swings. For once it doesn’t feel like judgment. “Naomi?—”
“Not yet, Vasso. It’s still my turn,” she says, and the faintest smile ghosts through the ache at her mouth. “Then yours.”
I nod because I promised myself I wouldn’t interrupt a woman who just decided to be braver in front of me. For me.
“I won’t pretend it was noble,” she says. “It was panic. It was me trying to hold back the ocean with my hands and resenting you for not guessing how hard my arms were shaking. You told me to stand with you. I will. From now on that’s my first reflex. Not running. Not hiding. Not mailing betrayal in velvet.” A breath. “Stand. With. You. With everything I have.”
I step closer because if I don’t, the need will climb my throat and speak for me. Her eyes don’t budge.
“My turn,” I say.
“Take it.”
“I punished you,” I say, and the sentence is heavier than the stone under us. “For a driveway I never let myself grieve. For a suit I wasn’t invited to wear and a ring someone else almost put on your hand. I said possession when what I meant was, belong to me, and I’ll belong back. Because I love you more than I love the air I breathe.”
Wind rattles the panes but we don’t.
“I wanted to make you into an answer for a question I should’ve asked myself,” I admit. “Am I still the boy who gets left on the curb? Do I always stand beneath the balcony and wait to be waved at? I made war on you because it was easierthan admitting I’d rather make a home.” I swallow. “Your light doesn’t dim mine, Naomi, it puts me in focus.”
Her breath hitches, not from hurt this time.
“Every crumb I ate, every cent I made, every asshole I let talk down to me,” I hear myself say, and it’s not pretty but it’s the truest thing in my mouth, “was so I could earn my way back to your side. To be worthy of you.”
Her eyes shine. She bites a laugh, and the sound breaks me softer. “Vasso, you were always worthy. From the first moment you caught me…” She falters, color blooming. “Caught me stealing apricots in the orangery and pretending it was for a still life.”
It’s ridiculous. It’s perfect. It pulls a smile out of me I didn’t plan to allow. “You had three in your pockets and two in your bra.”
“Research,” she says primly, then sobers because the morning is carrying too much weight to float for long. “But you were fighting for us longer than I realized. Forgive me for not seeing.”
“I forgive you,” I say, simply, because bone-deep truths don’t need speeches. “And I need yours.”
“You have it.” No pause. No penalty. “I’ve been fighting for us since the moment I realized that leaving you in that driveway was the biggest mistake of my life. But I admit, sometimes I was a coward about it, and sometimes I didn’t fight hard enough.”
“We’ll fight better,” I say. “Together.”
“Together,” she echoes, and it isn’t propaganda in this room. It’s geometry.
