He smiles gently. “The best things never are.” We sit together quietly until he falls back asleep, his aging body resting and healing from another bout of pneumonia.
A few days later, he comes home. We set him up in his bed, oxygen tank humming softly beside him now, the house filled with voices and movement and life. It feels fuller than it has since I was a child.
Later in the night, when everyone is finally asleep, Miles sits beside me on the couch, my head resting against his shoulder.
“You don’t have to stay,” I say quietly.
He looks down at me. “I know.” But he doesn’t move. For the first time in a long time, I let myself imagine a future that isn’t just survival.
And it doesn’t scare me.
In fact, it sort of feels like hope.
Eleven
Miles
Arkansas feels different after being here for a bit. Not prettier. Not softer. Just quieter in a way that presses in on you instead of spreading out. The land doesn’t roll like North Carolina hills. It stretches. Flat, stubborn, endless. Like it’s daring you to blink first. It’s not home, but it isn’t uncomfortable.
I stand on Danae’s porch with a cup of hot coffee cooling in my hands inhaling the fresh air. The house smells like antiseptic and old wood and something faintly sweet—whatever Josie baked last night after the kids finally went down.
Behind me, the house creaks as if it’s alive. Like it’s breathing around us.
Her grandpa has settled in without missing a bit, unbothered by all the extra people invading his home. It’s obvious in interacting with him how much family means to him. The moment Josie, Danae, or the kids enter the room his entire face lights up. He needs a lot. His care is demanding. He can’t help it. But being here, experiencing it first hand, Danae’s life is here with him.
That thought settles heavy in my chest. Not fear, exactly. Responsibility. I didn’t come here planning to shoulder any of this, but here I am, boots by the door, bike parked out front like I belong.
I don’t know when that happened.
Inside, Danae moves quietly, the way people do when they are in their own safe space, their element as it were. She hasn’t said much this morning. Just kissed my shoulder when she passed me, fingers curling into my shirt like she needed to make sure I was real.
I let her do what she needed. Sensing she wants to feel some normalcy I didn’t pull her to me interrupting her path to her tasks.
Raff and Josie are already up. Raff’s sitting at the table with a legal pad, trying to make sense of discharge instructions like they’re a wiring diagram for a car. Josie’s packing snacks and extra clothes with the efficiency of someone who’s done this dance before.
Family orbiting a crisis.
I don’t step in. I don’t need to. Danae knows I’m here. That’s enough.
Danae’s grandpa looks smaller being home swallowed by the bed, oxygen tubing looped under his nose. But his eyes are sharp. Always have been. He sizes me up when I step into the room, and I don’t flinch. Men like him respect that.
“Morning, sir,” I greet wanting to have some time to get to know the man who is a rock for both Danae and Josie.
He nods. “You ride that bike out front?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Hmph.” A pause with the man staring me down. I imagine back in his younger years he would have been intimidating to anyone trying to date his daughters or granddaughters. The man is six feet three inches filling out the hospital beds easily. The space of the room makes him seem smaller, but standing here under his scrutiny I feel my six feet two inches tall self, feeling about five feet tall. He smiles a toothy grin. Then with a nod, he tells me quieter, “Good. She likes to go fast.”
A small laugh behind me gets my attention. Danae flushes, half embarrassed, half smiling. I feel something warm low in my chest at the way he watches her, like he’s memorizing her face in case he ever needs to carry it with him somewhere else.
Danae sinks onto the edge of the mattress and presses her forehead to his hand.
“You scared me,” she whispers.
He squeezes back. “Didn’t mean to.”
She laughs softly, a sound edged with tears, and I look away to give them that moment. Some things aren’t meant for witnesses. She has to work tonight and I know leaving him is bothering her.
