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He closed his eyes and lowered himself back down onto the couch, nodding. “I know. I had the hardest time this morning leaving her there. I can imagine how you feel. I’m, uh . . . I’m sorry,” he said quietly.

“No, no, no, please, no apologies. I’m happy to be home, actually,” she admitted, a clear note of guilt in her voice this time. He shook his head, though he knew she couldn’t see him. “It’s still hard, to be here without her and Ashlynn, but I’m happy I’m home, really. Just promise me you’ll keep sending me pictures of her being adorable, and I’ll be fine.”

He smiled weakly and reached up to run a hand through his hair. “Yeah, totally. I can promise that.”

“Good. Then we’re good, yeah?”

“Yeah, we’re good,” he answered, pushing himself up to sit. Bri turned her head toward him and cooed and then started in on her ba-ba-bas again, and Ash smiled. “Here, I’ll make it even better.”

He took a short video and sent it to her, then listened again as Shaina laughed and maybe cried a little. And right when he thought maybe he’d be getting away without having to come up with an answer for the inevitable How are you? question, Shaina let out a quiet sigh.

“So, I know today hasn’t been easy, but are you doing okay?” The background noise coming through the phone went silent, as though Shaina had maybe stepped inside a building.

Ash leaned forward and rested his elbows on his knees. Maybe for once, he’d be honest and not try to sugarcoat. He wanted to. But when he started to say the words, they wouldn’t come. “I, um, yeah, maybe,” he managed instead.

At least that was wishy-washy enough that Shaina heard all the words he didn’t say. “Oh, sweetie. Wanna talk about it? I mean, I only have three minutes until class starts, but those three minutes are all yours if you need them.”

“No, no, you go ahead. I’ll be fine.”

“Ash.”

He sucked in a breath and then lowered himself from the couch to the floor and lay down on his stomach next to Bri. “You really want to hear about how sad I am, Shai?” he asked, unable to keep the edge from his voice. He immediately hated himself for it, though, which only made everything swirling around in his head even worse.

Instinctively, he shifted closer to his niece and reached out with his free hand to brush the hair back off her forehead. She giggled and lifted her tiny hands to grasp his fingers, and while that made him smile, it was as fake as any other smile he’d forced in the last week or so, even here alone with Bri in his apartment, with no one else to really need to convince of anything.

He closed his eyes. “I’ll let you go, don’t want to make you late.”

“Ash,” Shaina said again, and this time, he could almost picture her shaking her head, the deep sadness in her eyes seeing straight through him. “I don’t really care about being late if you need to talk. If it will help you at all, I can listen.”

Her words were sincere, and he knew she meant well. But he also knew there was nothing he could say and nothing she could say back to him that would help right now.

He swallowed hard and then rolled over onto his back away from Bri, covered his eyes with his free hand, and cleared his throat. “I’m sorry, Shai. I’m really trying here, but I’m just so lost right now,” he mumbled. All-too-familiar tears filled his eyes, and he sniffled and wiped them away. “It’s supposed to get easier. That’s what everyone told me after Mom and Dad died. And they were right. Eventually, it did. But this isn’t getting easier at all. It’s harder. Every single moment, something reminds me of her, and . . . and god, it fucking feels like my heart’s been ripped out of my chest, like this huge part of me is just gone and I’ll never, ever get it back. If I didn’t have Bri . . . If I didn’t have to keep going because of her, for her . . .”

The thought stalled out, and that deep, dark loneliness that he’d been trying so hard to keep at bay surrounded him, suffocating in its heaviness. He quickly rolled onto his side and scooted closer to his niece.

“Ba-ba-ba-baaaa! Ada-da-da-ba!”

She grabbed his hair this time, closing her pudgy little fist around a big chunk of it and tugging. It hurt just enough that he huffed a strained laugh as Shaina’s voice came through on the phone.

“Ash, god, I’m so sorry. I want to say I know how you feel, because your words, I could have said them too. She was my best friend, and it hurts so much that she’s gone. But I know it has to be so much deeper and so much worse for you, and I hate that there’s nothing I can do to help.”

“Ba-ba-ba-ba-ba-ba!”

There was a muffled laugh through the phone speaker, though it was still tinged with sadness. “She’s so stinking precious,” Shaina said softly.

“She is,” Ash agreed. He managed to get Bri to loosen her grip on his hair, and then he watched as she took a hold of his finger instead. She smiled and gurgled and laughed, and it hurt his heart even more. “She’s beautiful, too, Shai,” he said quietly.

“You’ll get through this. You will. It’ll take time, and it’ll probably always hurt. But it won’t be this bad forever, Ash. I promise.”

“Yeah,” he said. “You’re probably right.” He paused, feeling an uncomfortable tightness in his chest. Then he said, “I know you have to get to class, but thanks for calling. Sorry I’m—” He cut himself off and shook his head. “I mean, I’m trying to do my best here, and it’s hard, but I’ll keep going.”

“Yeah.”

Part of him suddenly and desperately needed to keep talking longer. To tell her more about how much everything hurt, to listen to her tell him the same. He wanted to just talk, too. About everything and nothing, about life and school and the future. Hell . . . he hadn’t told her about his sexuality, either, just like how he hadn’t told Ashlynn. And she’d probably have advice on how to talk to Cass, too—how to apologize for ghosting him and how to finally admit to Cass why he’d spiraled big-time after Cass’s last texts.

“Call me later? Or, actually, maybe it’s better if I call you? Can I call you? Tonight, after I put Bri to bed?” He fumbled over his words, overwhelmed by a nervousness that didn’t really make a ton of sense to him.

Shaina’s voice softened. “Yeah, that works. Call me anytime. Okay?”