Not dramatic, just full—like we’re hovering on the edge of something neither of us is ready to name.I can hear his breathing, the quiet rhythm of it, and the part of me trying to stay detached wonders why it suddenly matters so much.
“On nights when I wanted to feel close to Dad,” I say quietly, almost without thinking, “I’d look up at the sky.Not at the bright stuff—just the space between.It made me feel like he was still there somehow.Like the things you can’t see are still holding everything together.”
Nate doesn’t look at me, but I see his jaw shift, the way it always does when something hits deeper than he expected.
A long moment passes before he speaks, his voice low.
“There were nights I’d look up too,” he says.“See the moon, the stars and wonder if you were seeing the same thing.”
The words leave him like he didn’t plan to say them.
They hang there between us, fragile and impossible to ignore.My breath stutters, because for a second it feels like we’ve slipped back into an old version of ourselves—one where honesty didn’t feel like stepping into a minefield.
I don’t know what to do with the confession.I don’t know what he expects.So I keep my eyes on the slow movement of the constellations, pretending to study them even as my heart thuds too loudly in my ears.
The room feels suspended, as if time has stalled around us.
Neither of us moves.
Neither of us speaks again.
We just stand there, shoulders brushing, breathing the same quiet air, caught somewhere between the life we lived and the one we’re both afraid to imagine.
And for a moment—just a moment—it feels like the whole universe is waiting to see what we’ll do next.
CHAPTER8
DUENDE
NATE
Three daysago I was sitting in Valentina's studio watching her add finishing touches to the sky installation.Paint-stained fingers worked with the kind of precision that reminded me of Nora when she wrote—complete absorption, like the rest of the world had fallen away.
When I'd asked Valentina for after hours access to the gallery to surprise Nora for her eighteenth birthday, Valentina didn't even hesitate to hand me the keys.
"You're nervous," Valentina said, her accent thick, without looking up from the constellation she was mapping on canvas."About her being here, no?"
"Yeah."I ran my hand through my hair, a gesture that had become fucking automatic whenever I thought about Nora.
"It's complicated."
"Everything worth doing is complicated."
She stepped back, studying her work with the critical eye of someone who understood that art was about more than pretty pictures.
"Does she know about Luiza?"
"No.I haven't...I mean I'm going to.It's just every time I try to tell her, something comes up."I trailed off, swearing under my breath.I still couldn't string together a coherent sentence when it came to my feelings.
Valentina finally looked at me, her expression knowing.
"Nate, if this girl matters to you?—"
"She does," I said, the words coming out quicker than I intended as if to remove any doubt."She always has."
"Then you tell her the truth.All of it."She wiped her hands on a rag that had seen better days."The gallery will be perfect for it.Art has a way of making people brave enough to be honest."
Now, standing in that same gallery watching Nora shut down on the brink of walking away from me, I realize Valentina was right about the honesty part.But she forgot to mention how fucking terrifying it would be.
