Three years of careful control, of swallowing words and burying feelings and pretending that loving someone who could never love me back wasn't slowly killing me from the inside out—all of it collapsed at once. The sob that tore from my chest felt like it was ripping something vital loose, like grief had reached inside me and started pulling out organs by the handful.
I couldn't stop. Couldn't catch my breath between the waves of anguish that kept crashing over me, each one bigger than the last. My legs gave out, and I would have hit the floor if Dad hadn't been there, catching me before I could fall and pulling me against his chest like I was still small enough to hold.
“I can't—” I gasped against his shoulder, fingers clutching at his shirt like he was the only solid thing left in a world that had suddenly turned to quicksand. “Dad, I can't?—”
“Breathe,” he said, one hand rubbing steady circles on my back while the other cradled the back of my head. “Just breathe, son. I've got you.”
But I couldn't breathe. Couldn't do anything but shake apart in his arms while eighteen years of careful emotional control unraveled like a sweater with a pulled thread. Every breath felt like drowning, every heartbeat like something breaking that could never be fixed.
“He's gone,” I sobbed into his shirt, the words torn and bloody and tasting like salt and desperation. “He's really gone, and I never—I never told him?—”
“I know.” Dad's voice was rough with his own pain, the kind that came from watching your child suffer and being powerless to fix it. “I know, Evan. I know it hurts.”
“It's not supposed to.” The words came out broken, punctuated by gasps and hiccups that made me sound like the child I suddenly felt like. “It's just friendship. It's not supposed to hurt this much. I'm not supposed to?—”
“Love him?” Dad finished gently. “Yes, you are. You're supposed to love exactly as much as your heart can hold, even when it breaks you. Especially then.”
The wordlovehung in the air between us, no longer hidden behind careful denial and willful ignorance. He knew. Had probably known long before I'd admitted it to myself, had watched me fall for the human boy.
Fresh sobs tore through me at hearing it named, at having the truth spoken aloud in this room where I'd always felt safe to be exactly who I was. I cried harder, ugly and loud and completely without dignity, grieving not just for what I'd lost but for what I'd never had the courage to claim.
“He'll never know,” I choked out. “He'll go to Chicago and become this amazing photographer and forget all about the weird kid who couldn't even talk to him properly, and he'll never know that I?—”
“Hey.” Dad pulled back just enough to frame my face in his hands, forcing me to meet his eyes. “Look at me, Evan. Look at me.”
I tried to focus on his face through the blur of tears, tried to find something steady to anchor myself to in the storm of grief that was trying to drag me under.
“That boy loved you,” Dad said, voice fierce with certainty. “Maybe not the way you wanted, maybe not the way you needed, but he loved you. I saw it every time he looked at you, every time he smiled when you managed to speak. He loved your silence, your gentleness, your careful way of seeing the world. Don't you dare diminish that.”
“But it wasn't enough,” I whispered, voice raw and broken. “I wasn't enough to make him stay.”
Dad's eyes went soft with understanding, and he pulled me close again, letting me bury my face against his shoulder while fresh tears soaked into his shirt.
“Oh, son,” he murmured into my hair. “It was never about you not being enough. Some people are meant for bigger stages, wider horizons. That doesn't make them love you less—it just makes their love a different shape than what you thought you needed.”
I wanted to argue, wanted to rage against the unfairness of loving someone whose dreams couldn't hold space for small towns and quiet boys who spoke in whispers. But I was too tired, too wrung out from grief to do anything but cling to my father and let him hold the pieces of me that had scattered across the floor.
“He'll be back,” Dad continued, one hand stroking through my hair the way he had when I was small and afraid of thunderstorms. “Maybe not the same, maybe not soon. But places like Hollow Pines have gravity, son. They pull their people home eventually.”
“What if he doesn't remember me?” The question slipped out small and scared, the secret fear I'd been carrying since the moment Nate had announced his acceptance to Chicago. “What if he comes back and I'm just some guy he used to know in high school?”
Dad was quiet for a long moment, just holding me while I tried to remember how to breathe without it feeling like drowning.
“Then you'll survive that too,” he said finally. “Because you're stronger than you know, and because loving someone—really loving them—means wanting their happiness even when it doesn't include you. Even when it breaks your heart into so many pieces you're not sure you'll ever find them all.”
The words were exactly what I needed to hear and absolutely devastating at the same time. Truth wrapped in comfort, wisdom that tasted like medicine—bitter but necessary.
“I don't know how to do this,” I admitted, voice muffled against his shoulder. “I don't know how to let him go.”
“One day at a time,” Dad said, pressing a kiss to the top of my head. “One breath at a time. And you don't have to do it alone—that's what family is for.”
We stayed like that until my breathing evened out, until the storm of grief had passed and left me hollow but somehow cleaner, like a fever that had finally broken. When I finally pulled back, Dad handed me a box of tissues and waited patiently while I tried to make myself presentable again.
“Better?” he asked.
I nodded, not trusting my voice yet. Better was relative—I still felt like I'd been hit by a truck, still ached in places that had no names. But the sharp edge of panic had dulled, and I could breathe without feeling like I was drowning.
“Thank you,” I managed finally. “For letting me fall apart.”
