“The fans’ll love it,” she said breezily, like she wasn’t currently held together by denial. “Angsty Cha Cha. Public emotional mutilation. America eats that up.”
But her mom didn’t laugh or even crack a smile. She just lifted her gaze over her glasses, eyes tired and too wise for Holly’s bullshit.
Holly’s throat tightened. She looked away fast, because eye contact with your mother when she’s being quietly devastating was basically a war crime. “Mamá?—”
“Don’t youMamáme,” her mom said gently, like she was stroking a wound. “I saw your face,mi amor.You might think you’re a good actress, but you can’t hide fromme.”
That landed like a slap. A soft one, but a slap nevertheless. Holly stared at the muted TV like it might offer a trapdoor out of this conversation, her chest full of too many words and none of them safe.
“I found a ring,” Holly confessed softly, because if she didn’t say it now she’d choke on it. “In his bag. In Denmark.”
Marisol’s hands stilled mid-stitch.
“A ring,” she repeated. Calm. Measured. Like she was working through the math.
Holly nodded once, sharp, like it hurt. “A ring. In a box. Like a little velvet coffin for my sanity.”
Her mom tilted her head. “Did he give it to you?”
“No,” Holly snapped, then immediately hated how defensive it sounded, like her whole nervous system had flinched. “No. He didn’t. He didn’t even know I saw it. I found it by accident. He was in the shower…” She made a helpless gesture. “There it was. Like an omen.”
Her mom’s eyes didn’t leave her face. “If he didn’t give it to you, why are you acting like he did?”
The question was so simple, so quiet, so unreasonable in how accurate it was, that Holly’s mouth opened and no sound came out. Her heart thudded hard once, like it was trying to knock on the inside of her ribs for help.
She tried to shrug, to keep it surface-level. “Because rings are… you know.Rings.”
Her mom set her knitting down carefully on the coffee table like she was placing down a weapon. She turned fully toward Holly, and in that moment Holly was eight years old again, knees scraped, hands shaking, trying not to cry because crying made her dad call herdramatic.
“So you didn’t run because he hurt you. You ran because hedidn’t.”
Holly inhaled sharply, a sound that wasn’t quite a laugh and wasn’t quite a sob.
There it was.
The truth. Clean, brutal, and impossible to dodge. Holly stared down at her hands like she didn’t recognize herself anymore. How do you explain to someone that their gentleness is what scares you most? That a man who actually stays, somehow feels like a trap? Like a miracle you don’t deserve. As thoughthe universe will take it away the second you admit you want it.
Holly swallowed, but it didn’t help. There was a pressure building behind her eyes, behind her throat, behind her sternum.
“I don’t… I don’t know how to do this,” she whispered, voice cracking on the last word like it was made of glass. “I don’t know how to have something good without waiting for it to turn into something that ruins me.”
Marisol sighed and then reached for her daughter’s hand. “Mija…”
Holly’s composure lasted three more seconds. Maybe four. She tried to blink it back, tried to do the thing where she turns pain into a joke and tucks it into her pocket like spare change. Then her mind betrayed her with a highlight reel she didn’t ask for.
Nate tying her skates. Nate kissing her temple in the ambulance. Nate carrying her off the stage like she weighed nothing. Nate looking at her on the bench at Tivoli like she was everything he’d ever wanted and he didn’t know how to keep her.
Then the promo shoot. How he’d stood next to her like he was bracing for impact, eyes hollow with longing. The way she’d made him a stranger when he’d been trying so hard to still be hers.
Holly’s lower lip trembled, and then she broke.
It wasn’t pretty crying. It was the crying that came from a place so deep and full of grief it didn’t even make a sound at first, just a violent shudder that ripped through her chest. Tears spilled hot and humiliating down her cheeks. She tried to wipe them away angrily, like she could erase the fact she was losingcontrol, but that just made it worse, because then she was cryingandsmearing her mascara like a tragic raccoon.
“I’m so tired,” she choked, voice collapsing. “I’m so fucking tired, Mamá. I keep trying to be smart. I keep trying to be strong. I keep trying to make the right decision.” She sucked in a breath that tasted like salty regret. “It’s like I can’t tell if I’m protecting myself or just fucking myself over on repeat.”
Marisol didn’t lecture, because the time for lecturing had passed. She just moved over to the couch and folded her tiny frame around her daughter. Holly, who hadn’t let anyone hold her properly since Lars left her bleeding on a bench like she was disposable, crawled across the couch on her bad ankle and collapsed into her mother’s embrace.
“Shh,mi amor.”Her mom cradled her like she was little again, rocking slightly, palm stroking her back in slow circles. “It’s okay,” she murmured.
