I pressed my forearms to my thighs and stared at the floor, jaw clenched tight.
I’d spent years telling myself that needing anyone was weakness. That I had to be enough for Harper on my own. That accepting help meant admitting I couldn’t handle it.
But that wasn’t strength.
My phone started ringing on the counter but I didn’t move. I just sat there, jaw tight, staring at the floor as the call went to voicemail and the house fell quiet again. That was isolation dressed up as control.
And now Dani was gone. Not storming out. Not slamming doors. Just… choosing herself. And I deserved that.
I stood abruptly and walked to the window. Outside, the afternoon sun was beginning to dip, throwing long shadows across the yard. I reached for the curtain tie, hesitated—
Then let it hang loose.
Light flooded in, sharp as salt in a wound. And it hurt, but it also felt honest.
I picked up my phone from where it sat on the counter. Opened her contact. Closed it again.
What would I even say?
I’m sorry I punished you for my grief.
I’m sorry I treated you like a threat instead of a gift.
I’m sorry, I wanted you and resented you for it at the same time.
The words felt inadequate.
I leaned back against the counter, staring up at the ceiling.
For the first time since Elena died, I let myself think the thought I’d been shoving down every time it surfaced.
“Mommy would have liked Dani.” Harper had said once on the phone.
Elena had always loved people who brought warmth with them. People who laughed easily. People who made spaces feel alive. She would have noticed the way Dani paid attention, theway she listened, and the way she didn’t try to be the center of anything, but somehow still anchored it.
Elena would have told me to stop being an idiot.
The guilt rushed in, but beneath it, something else stirred.
Hope.
Terrifying, fragile hope.
I didn’t know if Dani would come back. I didn’t know if I deserved another chance after pushing her away like that.
But I knew one thing for certain:
Freezing my life hadn’t honored Elena.
It had only kept me stuck beside her absence.
And if I didn’t learn how to let light in, if I didn’t learn how to choose the living over the memory—
I was going to lose more than I already had.
Chapter 30
Dani
