He let the hand drop to his side, and it curled into a fist. “I want it. I want you. I just don’t know how to not fuck it up.”
I smiled, and it felt shaky but real. “Join the club.”
He leaned back against the post, eyes red-rimmed, and we stood there, shoulder to shoulder, not touching but not apart, either.
“Are you going to run again?” I asked, and my voice was so small I barely recognized it.
“No,” he said. “Not this time.”
The relief was a physical thing. It loosened something inside me, and I found myself laughing, really laughing, for the first time since I’d left.
He watched me, a smile tugging at the edge of his mouth. “I missed that,” he said. “The way you sound when you’re not scared.”
“I’m always scared,” I said, and it was the truth.
“Me too,” he admitted, and that was the first time I believed we might actually survive this.
We stood in the dark for a long time, the only sound the wind in the pine and the faint click of the spider weaving her webabove us. I wondered if she’d have a hundred babies, or if they’d eat each other before they ever made it off the porch.
Maybe that’s how you survived in this world: you just tried not to eat your own.
I shivered, and he noticed. Macon slipped off his jacket and draped it over my shoulders, careful not to brush my skin unless I wanted it. I did. I always would.
The porch light flickered as someone inside the house flipped a switch. Macon straightened, and for the first time since I’d arrived, he didn’t look like he was about to bolt.
“You want to come in?” he asked, voice gruff.
“Yeah,” I said, and it was the easiest thing in the world.
We went inside together, steps matched, our shadows tangled on the old pine floor. For the first time, the house didn’t feel haunted. It felt like a home.
The house felt different with Macon inside it. The walls didn’t pulse with old arguments or freeze your bones the way they used to, back when the only warmth came from the oven or a bottle.
Maybe it was just that he was here, close enough to brush my knuckles when he reached for the light switch, or maybe I was different, too tired to carry all the old shit.
We hovered in the kitchen, neither of us quite sure what to do next. Macon leaned against the counter, hands braced wide, head bowed so I could see the whorls in his hair. He looked like he could punch through the linoleum or collapse, and I wasn’t sure which I wanted more.
I hovered by the fridge, the hum of the compressor almost deafening in the silence. I rested my palm on my belly, felt the steady, insistent thump from within, and wondered if it would always feel like this—like I was one step away from shattering into a thousand hopeful, terrified pieces.
He didn’t look at me. “You hungry?” he asked.
“No,” I lied.
He nodded, like he didn’t believe me, but wasn’t going to push. He went to the sink and filled a glass with tap water, then slid it down the counter toward me. It stopped just at the edge of my reach.
“You need to stay hydrated,” he said, deadpan.
I grinned despite myself, but it slid off my face quick. “I’m not made of glass,” I said. “You can touch me.”
He set the second glass down with a thunk, and his hands curled against the granite like he was holding back a tidal wave. “I don’t want to do anything you don’t want.”
“I don’t know what I want,” I admitted. “I just know I’m tired of pretending I don’t miss you.”
That landed somewhere deep in his chest. He squeezed his eyes shut, and for a second I thought he’d bolt again. Instead, he turned, slow and careful, and crossed the kitchen until we were breathing the same air.
When he touched me, it was with the back of his hand to my cheek, a touch so light I could have convinced myself it never happened.
I leaned in, closing my eyes. “If I tell you I’m scared, will you think less of me?”
