I just stared at it. Couldn’t look away. Couldn’t make myself put the phone down.
Chapter 19
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— Indira —
Iwas mid-text to Vaughn, confirming dinner Friday, when Jacob’s name lit up my phone with our scheduled Sunday call reminder. My thumb hovered between two conversations, two men, two completely different versions of who I might become.
This had become my life in the weeks after my coffee meeting with Jacob. I was still seeing Vaughn, still living the vibrant Nashville life I’d built. But now Jacob was part of the equation too—our Sunday calls gave me a growing sense that he was proving himself in ways I hadn’t expected.
“So you’re seeing Vaughn and talking to your ex?” Emma asked over brunch one Saturday. “That’s a lot to juggle.”
“It’s not really juggling. Vaughn and I have fun together—he’s a great guy and I enjoy spending time with him. Jacob’s just... he’s in Millfield. We talk on Sundays. That’s it.”
“The motorcycle club president is cool with you seeing the hot musician?”
“He says he is. And so far, he’s proven it.” I thought about our last conversation, how he’d asked about a concert I’d mentioned attending without demanding details or getting jealous. “He’s being surprisingly mature about the whole thing.”
“What about Vaughn?” Sarah asked. “How does he feel about your ex sniffing around?”
“Vaughn knows about Jacob. He’s not threatened.”
They both looked surprised. I laughed.
“What, you think we’re getting married? We fucked. Past tense. After I met with Jacob for coffee, I needed space to figure out what I actually want.” I shrugged. “We’re still friends, still hang out. If Vaughn meet a girl he wants to be with, he’s free to do what he wants. No hard feelings. Besides, any day now he’s going to get discovered, go on tour, and I’ll be the last thing on his mind.”
Emma studied me over her mimosa. “And how do you feel about Jacob? Really?”
“Honestly? I’m not sure. Part of me is impressed by his growth. Part of me wonders if it’s sustainable.” I shrugged. “Jacob’s twenty-four hundred miles away. Right now he’s just someone I used to date. So I’m taking my time to find out if there’s any reason to think about him as anything more.”
I was reviewing campaign materials for a new client on Thursday evening when my phone lit up with Priya’s name. Unusual—we typically talked on Sundays before I spoke to Dutch.
“Priya? Everything okay?”
“It’s Dad.” Her voice was tight with worry. “He had a heart attack this morning. He’s stable now, but Indira... it was close.”
The world tilted sideways. “How close?”
“Mom said the doctors used words like ‘massive’ and ‘lucky to be alive.’ She’s trying to stay strong, but she’s falling apart. Can you come home?”
I hadn’t been back to California since before Dutch, hadn’t seen my parents in several years. We’d grown apart after I’d moved to Oregon for work, and the distance had only increased after I’d fled to Nashville.
“I’ll get the next flight.”
“Thank you. Mom needs you right now. We all do.”
The next twelve hours passed in a blur of airport terminals and worry. My father—stubborn, proud, seeminglyindestructible—laid up in a cardiac ICU. Machines beeped in syncopated rhythms, his heartbeat translated into electronic chirps I found myself counting obsessively. The vinyl chair by his bed squeaked every time I shifted, and I’d memorized every crack in the ceiling tiles during the long hours of waiting. My mother, smaller and more fragile than I remembered, sat on the other side of his bed trying to hold everything together.
“He was trimming the hedge,” she told me through tears. “Just fell over. If Mrs. Rodriguez hadn’t been outside...”
I spent three days rotating between the hospital and my childhood home, helping coordinate care and managing the flood of concerned relatives. It was exactly the kind of family crisis that put everything else in perspective.
Which is why I was completely unprepared when Jacob called Tuesday evening.
“Indira? I heard about your father. How is he?”
His voice came through low and steady, that familiar rumble that used to vibrate through my chest when he held me close. I closed my eyes without meaning to, remembering the weight of his arm across my waist, the heat of him at my back.
