Aria slipped past him, kicked off her shoes, and sat on the edge of the mattress. She looked up at him—not expectant. Just open. Waiting.
“Come here,” she said quietly.
He moved without thinking. Kicked off his own shoes, pulled back the covers, and slid in beside her. The sheets were cool against his overheated skin. She shifted, turned toward him, and opened her arms.
He went into them like he’d been waiting his whole life to do it.
She pulled him close—chest to chest, one arm around his shoulders, the other cradling the back of his head. His face tucked into the curve of her neck. She smelled like travel andjasmine and the faint salt of tears he hadn’t realised she’d shed in the car. He could feel her heartbeat against his—slow, steady, real.
No kisses. No wandering hands. No heat.
Just her holding him.
The first tremor started in his chest—small, then bigger. A sound escaped him—half sob, half exhale. He hadn’t cried properly yet. Not since the doctors had said “prepare yourself.” He’d kept it locked down, kept moving, kept pretending he could carry it alone.
Now it broke.
Quiet at first—shoulders shaking, breath hitching. Then harder. Tears soaked the collar of her shirt. He curled his hands in the back of her top, holding on like she might disappear if he let go.
She didn’t hush him. Didn’t tell him it would be okay. She just held him tighter, one hand stroking his back, the other cradling his head like he was something precious and breakable.
He cried for Nan—the woman who’d raised him when no one else could. For his mum, who’d whispered “keep driving” with her last breath. For his dad, who’d faded so quietly it still felt like abandonment. For himself—the boy who’d lost both parents, the man who was about to lose the only one left.
Aria held him through all of it.
Eventually the sobs eased into shuddering breaths. He felt hollowed out, raw, lighter in a way that hurt. She didn’t let go. Just kept stroking his back, slow and steady, like she could rub the broken pieces back together with patience alone.
His eyelids grew heavy. The exhaustion he’d been fighting for weeks finally crashed over him.
He slept.
Deeply. Dreamlessly. For the first time in longer than he could remember.
Her arms stayed around him the whole night.
???
Chapter Thirty-Three
Aria
The week slipped by in soft, quiet rhythms.
Mornings began early at the respite care unit. Aria and Jax arrived together just after breakfast—coffee in hand for him, iced matcha for her—settling into the familiar routine of the beige room that had become their temporary centre of gravity. Nan was weaker each day, but still present: eyes brightening when they walked in, small smiles when Jax cracked one of his terrible jokes, a faint squeeze of the hand when Aria read aloud from the old paperback romance novels Nan kept on the bedside table.
Some afternoons the nurses encouraged them to take Nan out for a walk around the grounds. The gardens were modest—neat lawns, rose beds starting to fade, a gravel path that circled a small fountain—but Nan loved them. Jax pushed her wheelchair slowly, pointing out birds or flowers, narrating ridiculous stories about the ducks that lived in the pond as if they were old mates from the track. Aria walked beside them, one hand resting lightly on Nan’s shoulder, the other occasionally brushing Jax’sarm. Nan would tilt her head back and say, “Look at you two—proper pair of lovebirds,” and Jax would roll his eyes and mutter something about her being a hopeless romantic, but the flush on his cheeks gave him away.
Evenings they returned to the Paddington flat. No grand conversations. No drama. Just quiet companionship. They ate simple things—takeaway Thai, scrambled eggs on toast, whatever was easy and didn’t require thought. They sat on the couch watching old racing replays Jax had saved on his laptop, or listened to music Aria played softly from her phone. Sometimes they talked about nothing important—Nan’s terrible taste in bridge partners, the neighbour’s cat that kept stealing socks off the line. Sometimes they didn’t talk at all. They just existed in the same space, breathing the same air.
One afternoon, Jax stepped out to speak with the nurse about adjusting Nan’s pain meds. The door clicked shut behind him.
Nan turned her head slowly toward Aria. Her eyes, still sharp despite the morphine haze, fixed on her with purpose.
“Come here, love,” she said, voice thin but steady.
Aria moved the chair closer, took Nan’s hand. It was cool, fragile, but the grip was deliberate.
“Jax is out there playing the hero again,” Nan said with a small, knowing smile. “Told the nurse he’d sort it himself. Always has to fix everything, that boy. But I sent him off on purpose. I wanted a moment with you.”
