Page 183 of The Ache That Stayed

Santino’s posture shifted instinctively the second he saw me hugging Julian. Marcello looked equally unimpressed beside him.

The second Santino’s gaze lifted and landed on me, his whole expression changed. Like he still couldn’t help reacting to me. Like some part of him always would.

Marcello noticed it too. Of course he did. His mouth twitched faintly before he looked toward me instead, steady and certain in a way only Marcello had ever been. Waiting for me, the way he always did.

And maybe that was the thing nobody tells you about healing. Sometimes it isn’t about returning to who you were before. Sometimes it’s about finally becoming someone you were never allowed to be in the first place. Because the girl I had been before Darius no longer existed. And grieving her took me years.

I walked toward them slowly. Toward the chaos. The love.

The life we had built from the ruins of everything that should’ve destroyed us.

For most of my life, I thought loving me fully would eventually exhaust people. That if they saw enough of me—the grief, the rage, the damage, the wanting—they would leave.

Instead, they stayed. And for the first time—I didn’t feel afraid of what came next.

Santino straightened first, stubbing his cigarette, already watching me like he’d been starving for the sight of me instead of gone an hour. His gaze dragged lazily down my body before returning to my face.

“Madonna santa,” he muttered under his breath when I got closer. “You’re driving me insane, walking around dressed like that.”

Heat curled low in my stomach despite myself. Marcello sighed and shook his head.

“You behave like a lust-struck teenager half the time.”

“And whose fault is that?” Santino shot back immediately, gaze dragging over me again.

I went on my toes first toward Marcello, pressing a soft kiss to his mouth. His hand settled automatically at my waist. Grounding. Familiar.

Santino immediately pulled me toward him the second I turned. He kissed me once—quick and rough—before his mouth slid deliberately to the curve of my neck.

“Behave,” I warned, breathless already.

A smirk curved against my skin, his hands sliding lower to the curve of my hip.

“Not when you’re dressed like sin, Volpi.”

Marcello snorted beside us.

“Get in the car before he puts on a show in public.”

And somehow—after everything—I felt whole. Because I was no longer at war with myself. And maybe, after everything, that was enough.

Loving them—and being loved in return—had taught me that I didn’t need saving. I only needed permission to stop fighting myself.

To Anyone Who Needs This

If you have experienced childhood sexual abuse, or any violation that taught you to distrust yourself, your body, or your voice, I want you to know this:

What happened to you was never your fault.

Survival asks impossible things of people. It teaches us to become smaller, to stay silent, to disappear inside ourselves, and to believe that being easy to love is safer than being fully known.

The Ache That Stayed is not a story about perfect healing. It is a story about shame, grief, anger, and learning that surviving does not make you broken.

You do not owe anyone your silence, nor do you have to become less of yourself to deserve tenderness. If you are able, I hope you tell someone you trust and seek the support you deserve. You were never meant to carry this alone.

Healing doesn’t always erase the ache. Sometimes it simply teaches us that we were worthy of love all along.

Wherever you are in your journey, I hope you know this:

You are not ruined.

You are not too much.

You were never meant to survive alone.

With love,

Velrith Rose