The question slips out before I can stop it, revealing the fear that’s been eating at me for days.
Alfie turns to look at me, his eyes full of understanding.
“Love that’s real doesn’t disappear just because life gets hard.But sometimes people need to find their way back to themselves before they can find their way back to us.”
We sit in silence again, and I watch the kids gather their things as someone calls them to head to the car.Soon it’s just Alfie and me and the lengthening shadows of late afternoon.
“Did you ever hear the story of the woman who asked a gardener why her plants kept dying?”Alfie asks suddenly.
I shake my head.
“She tried everything—more water, less water, different soil, fancy fertilizers.Nothing worked.So finally she asks this old gardener what she’s doing wrong.”He adjusts his hat again, a small smile playing at his lips.“Do you know what he told her?”
“What?”
“He said, ‘Stop trying so hard to make them grow.Your job isn’t to force life into them.Your job is to remove what’s stopping them from growing on their own.’”
“What was stopping them?”
“Too much of everything,” Alfie says, standing up slowly.“Too much attention, too much intervention, too much fear that they wouldn’t make it without constant help.I think at times, the most loving thing we can do is give people space to find their own way to the light.”
He tips his hat to me.
“That burn on your arm is going to heal, Nora.But only if you let it breathe.Same goes for all the other wounds you’re carrying.”
As he walks away, I stay on the bench, watching the empty playground like it might offer answers.I think about gardens and growth—about how some things need space to survive, and how loving someone doesn’t always mean keeping them close.
Sometimes it means letting them go before you start pulling up the roots.
CHAPTER35
IT’S ALL DOWNHILL FROM HERE
NATE
“So we just need you tosign here, Mr.Sullivan,” the nurse says, pointing to a clipboard full of discharge papers.
Her voice is gentle, practiced.Detached.Like she’s talking to a ghost who happens to still be breathing.
My hand shakes as I scrawl something that barely resembles my name.The pen scratches across the page, ink bleeding like an open wound.
This wheelchair feels like a cage.
I can’t feel much below the knees anymore—just a dull, hollow throb that reminds me I’m still here when I wish I wasn’t.
The withdrawal tremors haven’t let up—every nerve in my body buzzing like static, muscles cramping so hard I swear I can feel my bones grinding against each other.My skin itches from the inside out, the nausea rolls in waves, and my hands—fuck, my hands—won’t stop shaking.
They used to build things.
Fix things.
Now they can barely hold a fucking pen.
Nick appears beside me, silent as ever.His expression is unreadable, but his eyes say it all—pity, exhaustion, something close to fear.
He doesn’t speak, just takes the handles of the chair and starts pushing.
The fluorescent lights buzz overhead—this low, needling hum that grates right down my spine.Every sound is unbearable.
