Page 129 of Made for Mayhem

The urn sat on the nightstand behind him, daisies and violets glowing softly in the lamplight. The envelope leaned against it, unopened. I stared at it until my eyes burned again, but I didn’t reach for it.

Not yet.

Ty shifted, tugging the quilt up over us both. Outside, crickets started their evening chorus.

Inside, there was only the sound of two people breathing—one steady, one shattered.

I curled tighter into him, fingers still twisted in his shirt. The tears stopped, but the ache didn’t.

It sat heavy in my chest, a stone I’d carry forever.

But Ty’s arms were a harbor, and for the first time since the funeral home doors sighed open, the roar in my head quieted to a whisper.

I wasn’t okay. I might never be okay again.

But I was here. And so was he.

30

I stared at the curtains fluttering in the breeze, trying to hold myself together when Daisy couldn’t. All summer I’d watched her hold Junie up with one hand and herself with the other. She laughed, she danced, she planned the carnival, she hammered boards into Violet’s porch, moving through each day like if she just kept busy enough, grief couldn’t catch her.

But yesterday it tackled her from behind.

The moment she saw the urn, her legs gave out, and I’d never felt so useless. I caught her before she hit the tile, but I couldn’t catch the sound she made—like something inside her ribs snapped clean in two.

I carried her out past the hushed sympathy and too-sweet florals, her whole body shaking so hard I felt it in my teeth.

With each ragged breath, my heart broke.

The night swallowed her afterward. Hours of sobs that sounded like pain clawing its way out. I held her through it, arms locked around her, whispering useless things into her hair until she finally sagged against me.

By dawn, the shadows under her eyes looked bruised. Blonde hair fanned wild over my pillow, pieces stuck to her cheek. She looked like grief had scraped her clean and left a shell of her behind.

I wanted to keep her right there forever. Pull the quilt over both of us, lock the door, tell the world to go to hell. Instead Cluck Norris screamed bloody murder outside the window like a feathered alarm clock, reminding me the animals needed feeding, the day needed living, and the world kept moving, even when it shouldn’t.

I pulled her tighter against my chest anyway, breathed her in, and let myself drift into an uneasy half-sleep for as long as I could.

Gravel crunched a while later, and I cracked one eye open to see Beckett’s truck through the blinds.

Junie’s voice floated in through the open windows, bright and unstoppable. “DAD! You’ll never guess what Jace did!”

I eased my arm out from under Daisy’s neck. She made a small, lost sound—half protest, half dream—and I froze, heart in my throat. When she didn’t wake, I stood there like an idiot, just staring.

This was the part no one warned you about—how loving someone meant their pain hit you harder than your own, how it split you open and left you broken right beside them.

But I couldn’t break, not when they needed me.

I tiptoed across the dark room, Rowdy’s eyes following me as I moved to the dresser and pulled out a clean tee, replacing my tear-stained one. The urn still sat on the nightstand like a grenade with the pin pulled, and I looked back at Daisy still asleep in my bed.

Boots stomped on the front porch, so I grabbed the urn and put it on the dresser across the room instead. Still there, but not the first thing Daisy would see when she woke up either.

“Stay,” I said to Rowdy, whose dark tail thumped twice on the bed, understanding the assignment.

I quietly pulled the door closed, then went down the hall.

Junie exploded through the front door, cheeks sun-pink, cargo pants covered in marsh mud, rain boots halfway kicked off already.

“Oh my gosh, Dad, camping was so fun. We rented canoes and Jace got us stuck on the wrong side of the lake for an hour.”