I leave him to finish the last of his packing and walk out of his bedroom. The door clicks shut behind me, but the weight of it follows me all the way back outside. My shoulders feel heavier than when I walked in—the silence in Noah’s room still stuck in my ribs somewhere. I step back onto the deck, blinking against the shift from indoor light to late afternoon glare.
Ryan is pacing further down the deck, arms crossed, and probably waiting for me to deliver bad news. Adrian’s leaning against the rail, watching both of us with that quiet, assessing look he always wears when shit’s about to go sideways.
I lift my hands before Ryan can say anything. “I talked to him. He’s not upset, and he’s not leaving because of me.”
Ryan’s scowl doesn’t budge. “Yeah? What did you say this time, Damien? Offer to kiss it better?”
“Jesus,” Adrian mutters under his breath, but I shake my head and close the space between us.
“I didn’t say anything to make him leave. I didn’t even know he was thinking about it. He told me this was always the plan.”
Ryan doesn’t look convinced. He stares at me—still trying to decide whether to punch me or just keep hating me from a distance.
“He wants to live on his own,” I explain. “Not because of me, and not because of anything we did. He said it’s something he’s never had—independence. Being alone and making his own decisions without worrying what other people will think.”
Ryan scoffs, muttering something under his breath as he kicks at a loose plank on the deck. “That’s bullshit. This place has space. It’s not like we’re breathing down his neck every second. He’s got his own room, his own schedule—”
“It’s not about us,” I say, a little sharper than I mean to, but Ryan’s frustration is lighting a fuse I’ve been trying to smother since the second he shoved me earlier. I force my voice lower. “He’s never lived alone, Ry. Not without his parents hovering or feeling like he has to keep up appearances. This place might be home to us, but to Noah, it’s still a performance. Every dinner, every party—he’s been pretending.”
Adrian shifts on his feet, arms folded across his chest. “You’re saying he’s been faking it the whole time?”
“Not faking, masking,” I correct. “He’s been trying to make it work because he didn’t want to disappoint anyone. But that kind of pretending… it wears you down.”
Ryan’s jaw tics. He looks down, then back up at me, his expression still twisted with frustration, but there’s something softer flickering behind his eyes now. Something unsettled. “So, what? He goes off to live alone, and what—just spirals by himself in a tiny apartment? That’s supposed to help?”
“I think it might.” I run a hand through my hair, still a little breathless from the conversation upstairs. “Look, I’m not too stoked about it either, but I get it. He needs to figure out who he is when he’s not trying to be what he thinks we expect. He wants silence and control. To wake up and not have a calendarshoved in his face or Killian asking if we want pancakes or eggs for breakfast.”
Adrian snorts. “Killian’s food is half the reason I stay.”
Ryan doesn’t laugh. He folds his arms again and looks out at the perfectly manicured yard. “I still don’t like it.”
“You don’t have to,” I say gently. “You just have to trust him, and trust that if something goes wrong, he’ll call.”
He shakes his head, jaw working overtime. “He doesn’t call people when things go wrong, D. That’s the whole problem.”
I don’t argue, because he’s right. That part of Noah hasn’t changed. Even when we were younger, Noah held everything in until it cracked. He didn’t cry when his mom left. He didn’t cry when his father told him photography was a joke. He cried when he broke a camera lens. When his hamster died. Things that looked small but were really the final breaks in a long series of dents.
And maybe that’s what this move is. Not a spiral or a breakdown. Just a quiet step toward himself.
I lean against the deck rail, folding my arms and watching Ryan out of the corner of my eye. The weight between us has been there since the punch in the locker room. I haven’t had the balls to confront it until now, but seeing Ryan this worked up over Noah... I can’t leave it alone anymore.
“I’m sorry,” I say.
Ryan glances at me, startled. “For what?”
“For being a shitty friend.”
He frowns. “Damien—”
“No, let me say it.” I straighten fully, meeting his eyes. “I’m sorry for punching you. I’m sorry for everything that came before it, too. The silence. The avoiding. The pretending like none of it mattered when it did. I messed up. And I miss you.”
Ryan goes still. The muscle in his jaw flexes again, and for a second, I think he’s gonna make a joke or deflect. But he doesn’t.
“I missed you too, man,” he mutters, glancing away. “Even when I hated your guts, I missed you.”
“I deserved the hate.”
“Yeah, you did.” He looks back at me, but his glare is softer now. “You hurt Noah so fucking much, and I thought… I thought if I got you two in one room, that you might talk it out. But it’s been nearly three months, and you both still live past each other.”
