"True magic isn't always about staying. Sometimes it's found in the strength to leave until someone's capable of meeting you where you truly stand." She reaches across the coffee table, wrapping her fingers around mine. "And there are moments when the universe shatters what we've been clinging to. Not out of cruelty, but to release us from the burden of mending something that was never meant to be whole."
"I thought," my voice cracks. "If I loved him enough, if I was patient—"
"He'd magically wake up and choose you?" Grams snorts. "Ivy, that's not how it works. All it gets you is really good at pretending 'fine' doesn't taste like broken promises."
"But the signs—"
"Were telling you to wake up, not wait around." She points out. "Your cards have been screaming 'boundaries' for years."
"I thought if I never asked for more, he'd never leave."
"And how's that working out for you?"
"About as well as your crystal-infused kombucha business plan."
"Hey, that plan was genius. George just has no vision." She squeezes my hand. "But you know what the difference is between me and you right now?"
"Your questionable business ventures aren't emotionally devastating?"
"I know when to let go of something that isn't serving me anymore. You're not heartbroken. You're heart-exhausted."
"What's the difference?"
"Heartbreak is what happens when love ends. Heart exhaustion? That's what happens when you've been loving someone harder than they're willing to love themselves."
The words settle between us like truth often does. Heavy, but somehow lifting something else away. I part my lips to reply, but the sound of the squeaky doorhinges stops me.
"Eliza?" George's voice carries from the entryway. "I brought those herbs you wanted, though I still maintain that dandelion belongs in yards, not tea." He stops short at the sight of us, his kind eyes taking in my tear-stained face. "Ah. Emergency counsel in session, I see."
My throat tightens at his presence. George has been like a grandfather since he and Grams found each other, always ready with quiet wisdom and hugs that make the world a little less fragile.
"Just in time, my love." Grams' whole energy shifts at his presence. "We're untangling matters of the heart."
I watch through blurry eyes as George carefully unwraps his botanical offering on her counter. The afternoon light catches his silver hair while he arranges the herbs with the same care he probably uses with his beloved first edition books.
"I see you're arranging crystals again," he notes, catching my eye with a wink. "Though perhaps what's needed isn't rose quartz and celestial timing, but something simpler."
"Simpler?" Grams scoffs. "With Saturn squaring her Venus? The universe is practically orchestrating a cosmic renovation of her heart."
I curl deeper into the chair. "Can we not talk about my heart as if I'm not even here?"
George crosses the room and folds me into a hug. He smells of old books and garden soil, and suddenly I'm crying all over his vest.
"There, there," he murmurs, patting my back. "Sometimes tears are the best medicine."
"You sound like one of your poets," Grams accuses.
"And you sound like that astrology podcast you pretend not to listen to at midnight."
"I'm researching!"
"Of course you are." He settles into what's become his chair over the years, despite having his own apartment down the hall. "ThoughI wonder if what Ivy needs right now isn't astronomical calculations or healing grids, but permission to simply feel."
"I've been feeling plenty," I mutter.
"Have you?" His green eyes find mine over his reading glasses. "Or have you been trying to make sense of something that isn't ready to make sense yet?"
"That's what I've been saying," Grams interjects. "Which is why with Venus entering—"
