“There's fresh rolls coming out in ten minutes,” she said. “Mrs. Patterson already claimed three, but I made extra.” She nodded toward the dining room, where an elderly woman sat by the window with a paperback and a cup of tea. Mrs. Patterson had become a fixture at the B&B for as long as I could remember.She was someone who'd known Grace's grandmother, who'd watched Grace grow up.
“I'm okay.”
“You're not, but that's fine. You don't have to be.”
I almost smiled. That was Grace. Direct without being pushy, present without demanding. She'd been like that since we were young. She always knew when to talk and when to just let the silence do the work.
We stayed like that for a while—her kneading, me drinking coffee, the kitchen filling with the sounds of breakfast prep. She told me about a guest who'd complained that the stairs creaked too much. I told her about the kitchen fire call from earlier in the week. Normal things. Familiar things. The shape of a friendship built on showing up.
We stayed like that.
Her hands in the dough. My coffee going cold.
I drove home as the sun started to set, painting the mountains gold and pink. Sarah's words kept circling:Too safe. Nothing could ever surprise me. Security can be boring.
I thought again about the ring in my drawer. About all the ways I'd made myself useful—to Sarah, to the crew, to Grace. I was good at showing up. Good at fixing things. Good at being the steady one, the reliable one, the one who never asked for anything in return.
Where had it gotten me?
Three relationships that ended the same way. A drawer full of memories from women who left. A life built on being needed by people who never seemed to want me.
Something shifted in my chest. It wasn’t anger. It was something harder. Something closer to resolve.
I was done. Done being convenient. Done being the backup plan. Done auditioning for a role no one was ever going to cast me in.
I will not be a man people keep because I'm useful.
The thought crystallized, sharp and clear.
I will be a man who is chosen. Or I will be alone.
Either way, I was done pretending that showing up was the same as being wanted. Done telling myself that reliability was enough. Done making myself small so someone else could feel comfortable.
My father was wrong. Showing up wasn't the whole thing. Showing up only mattered if someone was waiting on the other side.
I pulled into my apartment complex and sat there longer than necessary.
The space beside me was empty.
I didn’t reach for my phone.
I stayed where I was, hands on the wheel, unsure of what came next—only that something had shifted, and I couldn’t put it back.
CHAPTER 2
Grace
I hadeverything I was supposed to want.
The house my grandmother built. The man I'd loved for eleven years. The life everyone said was perfect.
So why did it feel like I was disappearing?
The kitchen was dark except for the light above the stove, the one Gran always left on because she said the house needed a heartbeat at night. It was four in the morning. I'd given up on sleep hours ago. I pulled on my robe and came down to the kitchen the way I always did when my thoughts got too loud.
The dough was sticky beneath my hands, familiar and forgiving. Cinnamon rolls. Gran’s recipe, written in her careful handwriting on an index card so worn the edges had gone soft as cloth. The kind of thing you made when someone needed comfort but wouldn’t ask for it.
I pressed my knuckles into the dough and breathed.
