“You saved yourself,” he said. “You saved me too, even if I didn’t deserve it. You drew a line and you said ‘no more,’ and you walked me to the door and you didn’t look back. This—” his thumb pressed against the stitched halo around her figure “—this is the night you choseyou. The night you chose the life you deserved, even if it meant doing it without me.”
Tears spilled over before she could stop them.
“I don’t want to erase that night,” he said softly. “I don’t want to pretend it didn’t happen. I want it right here with the rest of our story. Not as the end. As the turning point.”
He looked up at her, eyes dark and raw and unwavering.
“I am all in, Lo,” he said quietly. “I knew from our first date that I was going to fall in love with you. And I did. I’m never moving on. There is no version of my life where I move on from being desperately, utterly in love with you. You’re it for me. You’ll always be it.”
Her heart thudded painfully.
“But,” he continued, voice steady, “if you decide you’re done—if being ‘Divorced AF’ is what makes you happiest—I will still be the idiot in the background cheering every success. I will still tell anyone who’ll listen that you are the bravest, brightest person I know.”
He took a breath.
“I will want you for the rest of my life,” he said. “And if the closest I get is watching you shine from across a room we’re not sharing anymore, I’ll take it. Because I love you more than I love getting my way.”
She made a small, wounded sound. He closed his eyes briefly, like the sound physically hurt him.
“I’m going to keep trying,” he said. “I’m going to keep building things that make space for who you really are. I’m going to keep choosing you over my parents, over my own pride. But you get to choose, Lauren. You always should have.”
He spread his hands slightly, empty.
“So,” he finished, voice rough, “this is me. All of me. Plastic tree in February, messy stitches, handmade necklace, and a heart that is entirely yours. I’m here. I’ll wait. I’m not moving on. Not in here.” He tapped his chest. “That’s yours forever.”
Lauren stared at him. At the tree. At the quilt. She lifted her hand to the necklace lying warm and imperfect against her collarbone. And just like that, the last fear she was holding onto loosened. Unknotted. Melted away until only joy remained—sharp and bright and overwhelming.
She slid off the couch onto her knees in front of him, the quilt soft under her hands.
“Tom,” she said. She cupped his face in both hands, her thumbs brushing the damp tracks at the corners of his eyes he probably didn’t know were there.
She thought of the patchwork heart drying on her dining table. She could almost feel fabric under her thumbs again, the drag of thread through cloth, the weight of that imperfect heart.STILL. A word she was ready to admit out loud.
She leaned in until their foreheads touched, the necklace a cool line between them.
“I love you,” she whispered. “And I am ready for you to come home.”
CHAPTER 69
Tom
For a moment,Tom couldn’t process the words.
I am ready for you to come home.
They were sharp, bright, disorienting. Something inside his chest lurched, then cracked wide open. He’d imagined this moment a hundred times. A thousand. But imagining it had never touched the reality of hearing her say it.
His knees went weak.
He made a sound—God, he didn’t even know what it was. A laugh, a sob, something half-strangled.
“Yeah?” he managed, his voice scraping out of him, wrecked and hopeful.
“Yeah,” she said, smiling at him. “Merry Christmas, Valentine.”
And then she leaned in. Her hands came up to his face, warm against his cheeks. Her mouth touched his—gentle at first, then certain, then full of all the things they hadn’t said, all the things they’d survived. The necklace he’d made pressed lightly againsthis sternum where her body leaned into his, one imperfect bead digging into his skin each time she shifted.
She loved him. She wanted him home.
