Words Unspoken, Part 2

Chloe hadn’t meant to end up here, on this exact bench, at this exact angle to the world. But after Riley’s explosion, the only thing that made sense was escape: down the path, over the bridge, past the willows, and into the coldest corner of the Inner Gardens. Here, the stone seat pressed hard against her spine and the overhanging eaves of green made a half-cave, thick with shadow and the musty chill of old leaves. Chloe sat with her knees drawn up, cardigan sleeves balled in her fists, forehead jammed to her thighs. She made herself as small as possible, and still it wasn’t small enough.

The quiet after Riley was brutal. In other lives, Chloe would have given anything for this much privacy, but now it only made her more aware of her own shaky breath, the way her nose dripped and her lungs rattled like a kid’s. Every time she tried to stop crying, her body betrayed her, spasming another sob up and out. She remembered when she was little, her mom telling her: “Crying only ends when you run out of salt.” Chloe had always imagined this meant there was a finite supply inside every person, a secret reservoir you drained a teaspoon at a time.

If that was true, she thought, then she was probably getting close to empty.

Chloe didn’t hear Emily approach. The first she knew of it was a soft thump, then a bare thigh pressed against her own on the bench. She startled, pulling back, and Emily held up her hands in apology, then dropped them to her lap, letting her hair fall forward in a curtain. She wore nothing but her hair and a loose smile—one of those rare, **** ones that didn’t ask for anything in return.

Chloe blinked hard, swiping at her face. “Sorry,” she croaked, voice ruined.

Emily shook her head, no need to explain. She folded her legs up, hugging her knees to her chest, and just… sat. She didn’t ask what was wrong, or pat Chloe’s shoulder, or make any move to fix the silence. The two of them sat side by side, breathing in the resin and water vapor and whatever else passed for air in this world. After a long time, Chloe’s breath slowed, the sobs tapering to a wet, rhythmic hiccup.

“You don’t have to,” Chloe started, but Emily shook her head again, lips pressed in a line. She reached out with one hand—just to the midpoint between them—and left it on the bench, palm up, an invitation that Chloe could accept or ignore.

Chloe watched the hand for a full minute, then let her own slip over it, fingers cold and damp. Emily squeezed, once, gentle.

After that, the quiet felt different: not punitive, but suspended. Chloe concentrated on the feeling of Emily’s palm against her own, tried to let it anchor her to the present.

When she spoke, it was slow and mechanical, like dragging heavy blocks into daylight.

“When I was twelve,” Chloe said, “I thought I had the whole world figured out. I knew I liked boys, and I knew I wanted to be pretty, and I knew that nothing truly terrible could happen to me if I just stayed good.” Her voice cracked on the last word, but she kept going. “But then I met Andy, and I liked him, and then I met Laura, and I liked her, and then I kissed Andy behind the gym that one day, and that’s when I figured out I was the villain.”

Emily’s hand tensed, a silent prompt to keep going.

"It wasn't even a real kiss," Chloe went on, her voice barely above a whisper. "He was telling me he didn't like me that way—that he couldn't—and I just... panicked. Like if I pressed my mouth against his, I could stop the words from being true." She twisted a loose thread on her cardigan. "He froze completely. I remember his hands just hanging there at his sides. And then someone must have seen us, because by lunch the next day, everyone knew."

Chloe drew in a shaking breath, but Emily waited, letting the silence do its work.

“For years, I told myself that I could fix it, if I just kept being a good person. I became the kid who looked after other people, who carried band-aids in her pencil case, who tried to make everyone laugh when they were sad. But no matter what I did, I still had this rotting thing in me.” Chloe’s hands shook, and she squeezed Emily’s as if it might break. “And when Riley said what she did, I thought maybe she was right. Maybe I’m just… cursed. Maybe nothing I do will ever be enough.”

Emily was quiet, but her thumb moved, drawing tiny circles on the back of Chloe’s hand. Her head was tilted, gaze soft but sharp.

“It’s not stupid, is it?” Chloe asked, ****. “To still feel this way, after all these years?”

Emily shook her head, and this time she did speak, voice small but clear. “No. It’s not stupid at all.” She paused, searching for the next words. “I think it means you’re still you. I think it means you care.”

Chloe sniffled, looking at her through puffy eyes. “But what if caring isn’t enough?”

Emily thought about that. “Maybe it isn’t. But if you stop caring, then nothing matters at all.” She looked away, scanning the trees. “I used to think if I could just be perfect, or at least not hurt anyone, then nothing bad would ever happen. But it did, and it still does, and I’m still here.” She shrugged, embarrassed. “You are, too.”

Chloe let herself exhale, sinking into the reality of it. “Sometimes I wish I could just apologize to Laura, one more time. Like maybe if I said it the right way, it would fix everything.”

Emily squeezed her hand, gentle. “Maybe you should say it anyway.”

Chloe nodded, not trusting herself to speak. She pressed her cheek to her knee, letting the tears leak out slow and quiet. Emily stayed, holding her hand, thumb still moving.

When Chloe looked up again, the sun had shifted. The light was softer, the edges of everything less sharp.

“You’re really good at this,” Chloe said, and it was almost a laugh.

Emily smiled, sheepish. “I’m not, really. I just… know what it’s like.”

Chloe’s gaze followed Emily’s line of sight, across the garden, where Andy stood talking with Marissa and Claire. But Emily wasn’t watching them—she was watching Andy, her eyes full of a quiet, careful interest. Like she was measuring the man Chloe had described against the one she saw now, and holding both truths at once.

Chloe wondered what Emily would make of her, if she told the whole story—every clumsy mistake, every selfish impulse, every time she’d been too scared to do what was right.

But for now, it was enough to sit here, in the dappled light, with someone who understood what it meant to want forgiveness.

They didn’t move until the shadows changed again, and by then the tears had dried and Chloe’s breath was steady. She let go of Emily’s hand, wiped her face, and for the first time in hours, felt lighter.

“Thank you,” she said, and meant it.

Emily just nodded, like she did this every day.

The Inner Gardens, after Riley’s outburst, had the charged silence of a room after an earthquake: dust settling, foundations unsure, every living thing bracing for the next aftershock. The women scattered themselves in new patterns, as if afraid that old alliances would only crack again if left unexamined.

Claire and Emi sat together at the lip of a shallow pool, their knees nearly touching, but their bodies turned at oblique angles. Claire, usually so careful about her own space, reached out without looking and placed her hand gently on Emi’s wrist. It was a fleeting touch—delicate as static, quickly withdrawn—but Emi brightened at the contact, and for a moment her six hands stilled, every brush and pen going quiet at once.

Emi breathed in, held it, then exhaled, eyes closed. The colors in her lap seemed to bleed into each other, as if the chaos inside her had found its way to the page. She didn’t speak, but gave Claire a soft nod, a signal that she was okay, or at least willing to pretend for now.

A little farther off, Norah stood beside the stand of bamboo, arms folded tight. She wore her defensiveness like a scarf—looped three times, hiding any sign of neck or vulnerability. Her face was impassive, but her gaze flicked constantly from the others to Andy, and then back again, like a scientist taking notes in a vivarium.

Marissa anchored herself to Andy’s side, her hand curled around his elbow. Her voice was quiet, steady, trying to fill the emptiness Riley had left behind.

“She’ll come back,” Marissa murmured, not entirely sure if she was talking about Riley or herself. “They always do, even if it’s just to finish the fight.” She pressed her cheek briefly to Andy’s bicep. “Don’t blame yourself. Everyone saw it coming.”

Andy didn’t reply. He stared across the lagoon at the farthest path, as if expecting Riley to reappear, or maybe someone else. Marissa misread his silence, and started tracing small circles on his sleeve, her own version of a mantra.

“If you want to talk about it—” she started.

“I’m okay,” he cut in, gentle but final. “Thank you,” he added, looking at her gratefully.

She didn’t argue. Instead, she squeezed his arm and stepped away, leaving him alone with his thoughts.

Sam paced the edge of the lagoon, her steps carving a line in the grass. She wore shorts and a faded UIC t-shirt, but her posture made her look more like a drill sergeant than a college dropout. Every few minutes she’d stop, glare at the water, mutter something, then resume her circuit with renewed intensity.

Andy watched her for a while, then caught the direction of her muttering: “You can’t let it rot like this, you just can’t. Someone’s gotta clean it out before it infects everything—god, why doesn’t anyone else see it?” Her voice was low, a growl meant for herself, but the frustration was clear in her clenched fists and rigid spine.

On the far side, Emily and Chloe walked the garden paths, their pace slow and matched, never more than a few feet apart. Emily’s hair was down, flowing in loose waves over her shoulders perfectly, as her transformation dictated. Chloe followed, arms wrapped tight across her chest, her eyes locked on the ground. They spoke in whispers, but sometimes Chloe would laugh, sharp and startled, as if surprised that the sound could still come out of her.

From his vantage, Andy saw the whole strange constellation: the way the women orbited each other, drawing close then spinning off, each tethered by invisible lines of history and hope and hurt. He wondered how long it would take for things to feel normal again, or if they ever would.

He glanced over to where Liesa should have been. The absence was glaring, like a missing tooth in an otherwise perfect smile. He felt the gap more keenly than any of the other wounds in the garden.

For a few minutes, Andy lingered, letting the warmth of the sun and the soft rustle of leaves wash over him. He catalogued the faces, the stances, the stories etched in each woman’s silhouette. Even now, after months of living together, he still hadn’t figured out how to keep them from fracturing. Maybe he never would.

At last, Andy stood and dusted off his hands. He walked the perimeter once, checking in with each woman—a quick nod to Norah, a gentle hand on Emi’s shoulder, a wave to Emily and Chloe, a soft word to Sam. He didn’t try to fix anything, or offer wisdom. He just let them know he was there.

When he reached the gate at the far end, he turned and surveyed the garden one last time.

The air felt different now—thinner, maybe, but clearer, too. Like the aftershocks were done for the day, and the work of rebuilding could finally begin.

Andy pushed open the gate and slipped out, leaving the others behind.

Andy wandered the corridor that ringed the lagoon, grateful for the chance to just walk and feel the air against his face. The hotel’s Main Lobby was nearly empty, save for the gentle ticking of a clock and the low hum of a distant vacuum somewhere below. Andy turned a corner and stopped short—Arabella was standing by the elevator, hands folded, her entire posture a study in patience.

It took Andy a second to recognize her, not because she was disguised but because her Host mask was almost entirely off. She wore a pale blue wrap dress, hair down and a little wild, and her expression was somewhere between maternal and nervous. Andy wondered if he should say something, or if Arabella would vanish into the elevator like a ghost.

Instead, she smiled—a small, real one. “Walk with me?” she said, as if she’d been waiting all morning.

Andy nodded, falling in beside her.

Arabella didn’t speak as they passed through the gardens’ main doors. They took the narrow gravel paths in silence, the only sound the crunch of their footsteps and the soft clatter of wind chimes from a distant arbor. The sun was half-hidden by clouds now, bleaching the color from the flowers and painting everything in shades of gray and blue. It was cooler here, and the only life in sight was a catbird hopping along the path, tail flicking in time with their steps.

Eventually, Arabella turned down a side path Andy hadn’t noticed before—a break in the bamboo that revealed a tiny clearing, maybe six feet across. At its center was a single round table, already set for two: blue porcelain teapot, pale linen cloth, slices of lemon and honey in a crystal dish. But what drew Andy’s eye was the bush just behind the table, a rosebush with a single perfect bloom.

It wasn’t the red or pink or even white of ordinary roses. it was blue—deep and saturated, the color of a summer storm at dusk, almost as if the petals were made of glass, and filled with swirling hues. Andy stared, uncertain if it was real or part of some tailored hallucination.

Arabella watched him with an almost shy pride. “My blue rose,” she said, as if reading his thoughts. “It only grows in two places. I thought you’d like to see it.”

Andy reached out, careful not to disturb the petals. “I’ve never seen one in real life. It’s incredible.”

Arabella poured tea into both cups, her hands steady. “Do you know what blue roses mean, in the language of flowers?”

He shook his head, still staring at the roses.

“Unattainable,” she said. “Or, more poetically, ‘impossible love.’” She sipped her tea, and for a moment Andy wondered if she was making a point about herself, or about him, or about the world.

Andy sat across from Arabella, the blue rose burning in his vision, petals almost iridescent under the cloud-filtered light. She poured tea with both hands, as if any less care would shatter the moment, and slid his cup across the table with perfect, unstudied grace.

He picked it up, watching the surface ripple. “Is it real?” he asked, nodding at the rose.

“Of course.” Arabella smiled.

Andy looked at her, searching for the edge to the metaphor. “Why here?”

“Because some things grow better where no one expects them to,” Arabella said, the words soft but certain. “And sometimes, you have to believe in them before anyone else will.”

Andy took a sip, letting the steam fog his glasses for a second. “It’s the same blue as Laura’s eyes,” he said, the thought out before he could throttle it back.

Arabella didn’t flinch. Instead, she reached across the table and squeezed his hand—quick, almost professional, but there was nothing Hostly in her touch. “I know,” she said. “That’s why I wanted you to see it.”

He felt the heat rise to his face, embarrassment and gratitude blending into something he hadn’t felt in a long while. “Thank you,” he managed.

Arabella let go, then hesitated, as if testing the weight of the air between them. “You’ve been sharing more stories about her. With the others.” She didn’t phrase it as a question.

Andy nodded. “A little.”

She leaned back, letting her guard drop completely. “I’m proud of you. Not as Host. As… whatever I am, when I’m not on duty.” She laughed, the sound unfamiliar and lovely. “It’s hard, isn’t it? Letting go of the fear that you’ll break everything if you talk too much, or feel too much.”

He stared at the rose again. “I think it’s harder to imagine anything good surviving without her in the world. Or that any of this—” He waved a hand, taking in the gardens, the women, the impossible island. “—could be worth it if she’s not part of it.”

Arabella was quiet for a long time, sipping her tea in small increments, as if buying time for the words to steep in her own mind. She studied the blue rose with a private smile. When she finally spoke, her voice was softer than Andy had ever heard it—so gentle it felt like it might bruise the air if it tried harder.

“She was part of it, and she still is. You know that, right?” Arabella looked him full in the face, not flinching from the sadness there. “You don’t have to choose between the world you’re building now and the one you lost.”

Andy picked at the linen with one finger, trying to find a way to answer without collapsing under the weight of it. “Some days, I feel like if I try to be happy, I’m betraying her. Like I should be working harder to fix it, or bring her back, or… something.”

Arabella set her cup down, the sound of porcelain on wood tiny but final. Then, in a gesture so unexpected that Andy almost startled, she stood, came around the table, and hugged him. It was brief—barely a squeeze, more of a transfer of warmth from one body to another—but Andy felt it settle deep in his chest, a shock of comfort.

She stepped back, smoothing her dress. “I know it’s not my place. But I wanted you to know I see you, too. The you that keeps going, even when it hurts.”

He blinked, startled by the burn behind his eyes. “Thank you,” he said, and meant it.

They sat in the silence for a while, just breathing, until the tea cooled and the petals of the blue rose began to uncurl in the late afternoon light.

Arabella cleared her throat. "How are you, Andy? And I'm asking as your friend, not as the Host." Her voice softened on the word "friend," like she wasn't sure she had the right to use it.

Andy studied her face—the slight furrow between her brows, the way her fingers twisted together on the tablecloth. She wasn't performing now. She was waiting, almost nervously, for his answer.

He reached across the table and took her hand. It felt small and unexpectedly cold in his. "Trust me, Arabella. We're friends. Whatever else happens here, that's real."

Her smile bloomed slowly, transforming her face. "You remember our conversation in the Library weeks ago? When I asked you to trust me?"

"I remember." Andy squeezed her hand. "Things have changed since then."

"For the better?" There was a vulnerability in the question that made her seem suddenly human.

"For the better," he confirmed, and meant it. Andy sat back, exhaling. The weight in his chest had shifted—lighter, but more focused, like a sandbag repacked for travel.

“I think I’ll always miss her,” he said. “If she were here, I’d hold her and never let her go. But I don’t love her any less for loving everyone else, too. It’s just… more. Not less.”

Arabella’s eyes went a little glassy. “Never stop loving her,” she said, voice hushed. “But don’t let it keep you from loving the people who are here, now.”

Andy took a deep breath. “You know, it feels strange," he said, turning the teacup in his hands. "Telling so many women I love them after just a few weeks. Having them say it back. Like I'm stealing something I haven't earned."

Arabella's eyes softened. "The HH isn't normal life, Andy. It's a pressure cooker, as you already noticed. The **** intimacy, the shared danger—" She leaned forward. "When people survive something together, when one person becomes a protector, feelings accelerate. It's human nature."

She held his gaze, her voice gentling. "But this only works because you're you. Because when you say it, you mean it." She paused, glancing toward the garden where Riley sat alone. "And right now, she needs that. The man who understands what it means to lose everything." She held his gaze, letting the words sink in. “Grief breaks people in jagged ways. You know that better than anyone.”

Andy didn’t answer. He wasn’t sure he could.

Arabella patted his hand again, this time letting the touch linger. “You’ll do what’s right. You always do.”

He smiled, small. “Thank you. For caring.”

Arabella’s eyes flashed with something almost bashful, an echo of the girl she might have been before all the masks. “I didn’t always,” she admitted. “For a long time, I was Host. Just Host. It’s only lately I realized I could be more than that.” She looked away, embarrassed by her own candor.

Andy tried to meet her on the same ground. “What changed?” he asked.

Arabella hesitated, then shook her head. “That’s a story for another time,” she said, but her eyes said she wanted to tell it. Just not yet.

They finished the tea, watching the clouds turn the sky from blue to purple to the color of bruised plums. When the light grew thin, Andy left the garden with a sense of peace he hadn’t felt in months, and as he glanced back, he saw Arabella watching him, hand pressed to her heart.

She stayed there until he turned the corner, then vanished into the dusk, leaving only the scent of tea and the memory of impossible love behind.

Dusk found the Inner Gardens in a kind of suspended animation, every line and color muted under the lowering blue of the sky. Lanterns came on one by one, dotting the paths with pools of false warmth. It was the hour when most guests retreated indoors, leaving the outside world to the holdouts: the restless, the lonely, the people who needed something from the dark.

Tonight, Emi worked beneath a paper lantern shaped like a dahlia, her six hands orchestrating a ballet of brush, ink, and rag. The light cast strange, dramatic shadows across her face and arms, doubling and tripling her outline so that she seemed to shimmer in and out of existence as she worked. Emily watched her from the next bench over, one leg curled under her, the other stretched to catch the last of the sun’s warmth.

Chloe sat beside her, their hips almost touching. Earlier, Emily would never have dared to share a bench with Chloe, let alone linger in the silence that followed Chloe’s tears. But now it seemed the most natural thing in the world to just… be there. Chloe had said maybe six words since the crying stopped, but her hand kept wandering, almost by accident, to brush against Emily’s wrist or thigh, each time retreating in embarrassment. Emily found she liked it, the rhythm of reach and retreat.

A little farther down, Dawn perched on the edge of a low stone wall, knees drawn up, chin in her hands. She looked at nothing, or maybe everything, her eyes trained on the shifting surface of the lagoon. Her bunny ears lay flat tonight, drooping with an exhaustion that made Emily ache a little just to see it. Once in a while, Dawn would glance at the sky, then back at the water, as if waiting for a sign.

Sam was still on her circuit, circling the garden’s edge with a kind of violent focus. She’d swapped her shorts for jeans, but her gait was unchanged: long strides, fists jammed in her pockets, head down and scowling. She looked, Emily thought, like someone trying to beat the world record for most laps walked before sunset.

From her vantage, Emily could see the path to wherever Andy had gone with Arabella, and she caught the moment Andy returned. He walked slower than usual, his shoulders hunched and his hands stuffed in his jacket pockets. Arabella was not with him.

Emily watched Andy move down the walkway. She saw the tightness in his jaw, the way he seemed to press something invisible into his palm before he let go. Then he continued on, toward the small crowd at the center of the garden.

Emily felt a rush of something—maybe it was hope, or maybe it was the old, familiar longing to be chosen, to matter to someone. She turned to Chloe, who was now tracing invisible shapes on her own thigh.

“Are you okay?” Emily asked, keeping her voice low.

Chloe nodded. She wiped at her face and tried a smile. “Thank you, for before. I didn’t mean to… you know. Fall apart.”

Emily shrugged, offering her own version of a smile. “Sometimes it’s the only thing that works.”

Chloe made a small noise, half laugh, half sigh. “I don’t want to be a burden,” she said, almost whispering.

“You’re not,” Emily said, and squeezed Chloe’s hand for emphasis. She thought she saw surprise, then relief, in Chloe’s eyes. It made her feel like maybe she was getting better at this—being a person, not just a function of other people’s desires.

Emi’s painting was finished. She set down her brush and flexed all six hands at once, a gesture that looked equal parts victory and surrender. She glanced around, found Emily watching, and offered her a wave. Emily waved back, then turned her attention to the far side of the garden, where Andy was now talking with Norah and Marissa.

He looked different tonight. More tired, but also more… open, maybe. He listened to Marissa with the intensity of a man memorizing his last meal. When Norah joined, he greeted her with a smile—not ****, not polite, but real. Norah softened, her arms lowering, her body language shifting from closed to almost curious.

For a moment, Emily envied them. She had never learned how to just belong to a group, how to let herself be absorbed by a story that was larger than her own. She’d always been a side character, the comic relief or the hot extra who never got a last name. Even with Jake, even in the dream throuple, she’d felt like an observer, not the main act.

Now, though, she felt something shifting. Maybe it was the conversation with Chloe, or maybe it was watching Andy try so hard with everyone, or maybe it was just the way the sky looked tonight—clear and infinite, a blue so deep it made her chest hurt.

She watched Andy, and for the first time since arriving, she wanted to trust him. Not because he’d earned it, exactly, but because she wanted to be the kind of person who could.

She glanced at Chloe, then Emi, then Dawn, and made a silent promise: tomorrow, she’d try. She’d talk to Andy. She’d give him the chance to earn it.

There were only two nights left before decisions would be made. Emily didn’t know if she’d stay, if she even wanted to belong to someone who might hurt her again. But tonight, with the garden glowing blue and the air so heavy it felt like a blanket, she let herself hope.

The lanterns swayed, casting wild patterns on the paths. In the distance, she saw Andy look her way, then raise his hand in a shy, uncertain wave.

Emily waved back.

Maybe that was enough, for now.

The Master’s Suite was dark except for a single lamp above the bar, a wan circle of yellow that made the shadows on the ceiling look like brushstrokes. Andy let the elevator door close behind him and stood just inside, shoulders hunched. He waited for the rush of warmth or safety that usually followed him in here, but tonight there was only silence, thick and expectant. Soon, Liesa would be here.

He walked to the bedroom, and there Katherine stood, reclining with her shoulder against the frame of the painting. Tonight, her smile was small but determined, her eyes bright and alert.

For a long time, he said nothing, just watched the subtle shifts in her painted posture: the bend of her knee, the cock of her hip, the way her fingers hovered, as if she might reach through the glass if she tried hard enough.

“I’m sorry,” he said at last. “I should’ve been paying more attention to you. I got…” He trailed off, unable to finish the sentence.

Katherine shrugged. She lifted one hand, palm up, then brought it to her chest and tapped her heart twice. I’m not mad, he thought she signed, then added a two-fingered kiss blown from her lips to his.

Andy smiled, embarrassed. “I know. But I hate that I left you alone. Even for a day.”

She gestured, quick and deft: both hands together, then arcing apart like the opening of a flower. Then she pointed at him, at the couch, at the whole world.

He laughed, but it came out as a choked sound. “You’re too good for me, you know that?”

Katherine rolled her eyes. She made a face, lips pursed, then traced a heart in the air.

He watched her, aching with all the things he could never say out loud. “I’ve been worried about Riley,” he admitted. “And Liesa. I think they’re both about to shatter, and I don’t know if I can hold them together. I don’t know if I should.”

Katherine listened, her painted face intent. She mimed a scale, one hand rising and the other falling, then made the gesture for let it go: hands cupped together, then opening wide, releasing something into the air.

“I know,” Andy said, staring at his knees. “It’s not my job to save them. But if I don’t try, what’s the point? Why am I even here?”

Katherine tilted her head, then wrapped her arms around herself, hugging her own torso tight. She pressed her cheek to her shoulder, eyes closed, then looked back at him.

He shook his head. “It’s not that simple, Kat. Liesa’s got secrets, and if she doesn’t come clean, they’ll eat her alive. But she’s too terrified of conflict, and she fears Dawn’s reaction if she admits her secret. Riley—she’s in a different place. She wants to be angry, and she wants everyone else to feel it, too.”

Katherine nodded, then held up one finger, as if to say: wait. She pointed at him, then at her own chest, then tapped the invisible glass between them. She splayed her hands wide, palms pressed flat to the barrier, fingers straining, and then slumped, defeated.

It took Andy a minute to understand. “You want to hug me,” he said.

She nodded, not hiding the longing in her eyes. She pressed her painted hands to the glass, and the whole line of her body quivered with the effort of holding back.

Andy stood, stepped close to the frame, and pressed his own palm to hers. The chill of the glass bit his skin, but he held it there, letting the imaginary contact fill the space between them.

“I’d give anything to touch you,” he said.

Katherine smiled, a sad, crooked thing. She mimed a sigh, then blew another kiss, this one slower, more deliberate. She touched her heart, then his, then her heart again, as if completing a circuit.

He exhaled, letting the moment settle in his chest. “You always know what to say,” he told her. “Even if you can’t say it.”

Katherine went still, then pantomimed a new gesture: hands cupped together, then brought to her lips and pressed there. She looked at him, her eyes wide and ****.

Andy understood. “You’re scared, too,” he said.

She nodded, quick and sharp.

He turned away, unable to meet her gaze. “I’m not strong enough for this, Kat. I’m just trying to get everyone to the finish line without falling apart.”

She tapped the glass again, harder, then pointed at him, at her own head, at her own heart, then back at him. Her face was fierce, almost angry.

He laughed, but it was a better sound this time. “Okay, okay. I get it. I can do this.”

She softened, then let her hands drop to her sides. She looked at him for a long moment, then traced a heart with both hands, held it up, and let it burst into invisible confetti.

Andy felt something catch in his throat. “That’s why I love you,” he said.

Katherine glowed at that, her whole body leaning forward, as if she might tumble out of the frame and into his arms. She beamed, lips parted in silent joy.

He stepped back, wiped his face, and **** a breath. “I’ll do it,” he promised. “I’ll talk to Liesa tonight. And Riley, if I can get her to listen.”

Katherine nodded, solemn and proud.

He smiled at her, then at the world. “Thank you,” he said, and meant it.

Katherine only watched, the hero she’d always been.

Andy turned out the lamp and let the darkness fill the room, the only light now the moon’s reflection on the glass, painting his own face next to hers.

He sat with her, like that, until he was strong enough to face the world again.