“Then you’ll understand why trusting you isn’t exactly top of my list.” A hard laugh bursts out of me. “You don’t get to vanish and show up years later acting like nothing happened.”
I set the bag down a little too firmly, a tin of cranberry sauce rolling out and clattering to the floor.
He bends to pick it up before I can, straightens, and holds it out to me. His eyes find mine again, regret surfacing like an old wound. “I never meant to hurt you.”
“Well, congratulations,” I say, taking the tin. “You did anyway.”
He exhales, slow and heavy, like he’s been holding that breath for years. “I should go.”
“Probably for the best.”
He hesitates, glances at the window. Snow still falls in slow, thick flakes. He looks like he wants to say more, but doesn’t.
Instead, he grabs his coat from the peg, pulls it on, and turns back at the door.
“Stay safe,” he says quietly.
“I’ll manage.”
Our eyes meet for one last second — long enough for me to see something raw there— and then he’s gone, the door closing behind him with a muted thud.
I let out a long breath, and try not to listen to the part of me that wanted him to stay.
7
Holt
The door shuts behind me, shutting out the warmth and coziness. And her.
An icy wind tears through me.
But I barely feel it, because now, I really see it.
She’s been hurting.
All these years, she’s been hurting.
I never understood.
When I left, I thought I was sparing her.
She was just a kid—bright, ambitious, too good for a thing like me. She’d forget me in a moment, then find a boy her own age.
Some college boy who’d make her laugh and buy her nice things.
That was the story I clung to. The one that let me sleep.
But the way she looked at me?—
God.
That wasn’t anger. That was a wound that never healed.
And I put it there.
I don’t often let myself think about the minutes after I walked away from her that night. It’s easier to remember the fear of losing control than what came next.
I heard her call my name.
