But every time I try to settle into that narrative, another memory cuts through it. The look in Andi’s eyes when she asked me to believe her. Not defiant. Not manipulative. Terrified. Not of being exposed—but of losing me.
The pounding on my door jolts me out of the spiral. I know who it is before I open it.
Brandon doesn’t wait for an invitation. He forces his way inside, his countenance a mix of fury and disbelief. He looks at me like I’ve become someone he doesn’t recognize.
“You left her,” he says, and there’s no shouting at first—just a weight in the words that feels heavier than anger.
“She lied to me,” I fire back automatically, because I need that sentence to hold.
“Did she?” he asks, and now his voice sharpens. “Or did she not tell you yet? There’s a big difference, Luke.”
I turn away from him, running my hands through my hair, trying to keep control of the narrative I’ve built in my head. “She was committed. There are documents. There are pictures. That’s not small, Brandon. That’s not something you just forget to mention.”
“And did you ask her why?” he demands. “Did you let her explain? Or did you see the wordinstitutionalizedand decide she was unstable?”
The comparison hits before I can block it.
“You don’t understand,” I say, but I hear the weakness in it. “I won’t go through another Megan.”
Brandon exhales sharply, the sound filled with years of frustration. “This isn’t Megan. You’re the only one still fighting Megan. And you’re swinging at the wrong person.”
He steps closer, lowering his voice. “I picked her up off the floor, Luke. She collapsed when you walked out. Not because Dad had papers, pictures, and accusations. Because you left her. You abandoned her when she needed you most.”
That image lodges somewhere deep in my chest. I didn’t see her fall. I didn’t hear her cry after I stepped out the door. I didn’t look back.
“You think Dad was protecting you?” Brandon continues. “He didn’t ask questions. He delivered a verdict. And you joined him at the guillotine.”
The room falls quiet after that. The accusation isn’t loud, but it’s precise.
“She should have told me,” I say again, though it sounds thinner now.
“She was going to,” he replies. “She asked you to believeher when the time came. And when it came, you chose fear.”
I don’t have an answer for that.
“Luke, she’s nothing like Megan. Look, you never listened to me about Megan. She had been hitting on me for a while, but I didn't think much of it until she openly propositioned me. She didn’t care which one of us she was with. She was just trying to play both of us. When she kissed me, I pushed her away, I swear. She’s not the standard you should measure any other woman against.”
“You never looked at Megan the way you do Andi. You never cared enough about Megan to even fight with her. The only part of you that hurt over Megan was your pride, and you know it. What happened to Dad’s business wasn’t your fault any more than it was mine. And you know Megan’s not worth even mentioning again, much less thinking about."
When I don't say anything, Brandon continues. "Not once has Andi ever been even slightly interested in me. Even when you claimed you were just friends and I was openly flirting with her, I love you, man. But if she ever looked at me the way she looks at you, I would take her away from you in a heartbeat. You obviously do not know what you have in her.”
He looks at me for a long moment, and when he speaks again, the anger has completely drained from him. “If this is how you handle someone’s worst moment while claiming to love her, you don’t deserve her.”
Then he leaves, and the silence he leaves behind is worse than the confrontation.
It has been just over a month since Mack set the clock. And already everything feels unstable.
ANDI
I don’t remember the exact moment my knees buckled—only the sickening lurch as the world swayed and the hardwood floor rushed up to meet me. My palms scraped against the floor, and for a second, all I could see was the blur of wood beneath my cheek, the taste of salt and panic thick on my tongue. Somewhere above me, the door closed with a final, echoing click. Luke wasn’t coming back through it.
It wasn’t just the accusations that hurt. It was the way he recoiled, as if my very presence might burn him. That instinctive retreat—like I was something dangerous, something to be feared—cut deeper than any words evercould. I felt myself shrinking, folding in on the empty ache where hope used to live.
Brandon’s arms were suddenly around me, lifting me as if I weighed nothing at all. He didn’t ask permission. He just carried me out to his truck, muttering curses at his father, at the universe, at the mess we’d all become. I barely heard him. My body felt scooped out, emptied, as if something vital had been torn from the center of me and left behind in that room.
When we reached my house, Brandon stayed. He didn’t press for explanations or try to fill the silence. He just sat across from me, his presence serving as a quiet anchor in the storm. “He reacted,” he said, voice coarse. “He’ll come back.”
Maybe. But love that disappears under pressure doesn’t feel like love at all. It feels like a test I was always meant to fail.
