“I’m sorry.” She’s crying now, not trying to hide it. “I’m so sorry. I never meant—I didn’t think?—”
“No.” Nate’s voice cuts through. Flat. Cold. “You didn’t think.”
We all look at him. He’s still staring at his water glass, but his hand is shaking slightly.
“You didn’t think about what it would do to us. You didn’t think about the calls we made, the letters we wrote, the nights we spent wondering what we did wrong.” His voice doesn’t rise, butsomething in it makes my chest tight. “You were scared. Fine. But we were destroyed.”
Cara flinches like he hit her.
The silence stretches. Around us, other tables are laughing, enjoying their dates. We might as well be on a different planet.
Then Nate sets his glass down. Stands.
“I need air.”
He doesn’t wait for a response. Just turns and walks toward the exit.
Lucas is on his feet a second later. He looks at Cara, then at me, something unreadable in his expression. “I’m sorry. We need to?—”
He doesn’t finish. Just follows Nate.
And I’m sitting here. Across from the woman I’ve loved for half my life, watching her cry, every instinct screaming at me to stay.
But we’re a pack. Even broken. Even hurting. We don’t leave each other behind.
“Theo.” Her voice cracks on my name. “Please.”
I stand. My chest feels like it’s caving in.
“I’m sorry,” I say. And I mean it—for leaving, for not being strong enough to stay, for all of it. “I have to go.”
I make myself turn. Make myself walk away from those brown eyes, that honey-citrus scent, the sound of her trying not to sob.
At the door, I look back.
She’s alone at the table. Shoulders hunched, face in her hands. The candles flicker around her like some kind of cruel joke—all this Valentine’s Day romance, and she’s sitting there shattered.
I almost go back. Almost.
Then I push through the door into the cold.
Nate’s leaningagainst Lucas’s car, arms crossed, staring at nothing. Lucas is beside him, hands in his pockets.
Neither of them speaks when I walk up.
We stand there in the parking lot, breath fogging in the February air. Inside, I can hear music starting up. Dancing. People enjoying their evening like the world didn’t just crack open.
“She told us why,” I finally say. “The real reason.”
“I heard.” Nate’s voice is rough. “All of it.”
“And?”
Silence.
“I don’t know.” He shakes his head. “I don’t know if it changes anything. She was scared, fine. She was eighteen, fine. But so were we. And we didn’t disappear.”
“No,” Lucas agrees. “We didn’t.”
