Of course, it's Madison.
"Oh, hey," she says when she sees Fisher and me standing frozen at the end of the hall.
London's fists are clenched at his sides, his eyes tortured, and I know…I know without asking what happened behind that door, but I do it anyway. I can practically taste the betrayal coating my tongue like poison. But if this is how we end, if this is how he destroys everything we built together, he doesn't get to take the coward's way out. He's going to use his words and tell me to my face that we're over. There's no cop car here to drive him away this time, no murder to hide behind.
"Tell me this isn't what it looks like, London." I try to keep my tone even when, inside, I'm splintering, each jagged piece piercing deeper than the last. The way his eyes are looking at me now, with guilt and pain, only adds insult to injury. He knew what he was doing. "Say it!" I yell, and everyone flinches.
Madison's pale-blue eyes dart from me to him like she's watching a tennis match, and I see the exact moment she realizes she's witnessing our end.
London's right eye twitches, and his eyes turn glassy with unshed tears that he has no right to cry. When he speaks, his voice breaks on every syllable. "I can't tell you that."
The words hit me like bullets, each one finding its mark and tearing through what's left of my heart. This is it. This is how ourlove dies, with four words that reduce everything we were to nothing.
"Are you fucking serious, man?" Fisher explodes, his voice cracking with emotion. "Do you have any idea what you've just done...where we've been all day?—"
"Fisher, don't," I say, panic flooding my system as I realize what he's about to reveal. I press my hand instinctively to my stomach. I don't want London to know, not like this. I don't want his pity, and I sure as hell don't want his empty apologies for the sake of our unborn child.
"But, Laney?—"
"No." The word comes out sharp and clear. "He chose this. Let him have it. He's not worth it." I pause, letting the truth settle in my bones like lead. "Turns out he never was."
I watch London's Adam's apple bob as my words choke him, watch the way his face crumples like I've physically struck him. Still, he says nothing. The silence stretches between us, heavy with all the words we'll never say, all the promises he's broken, all the tomorrows he's stolen from us. I'm hurting him. I can see it in the way his shoulders shake, in the tears that finally spill over and track down his cheeks. Which means he cared. He loved me. Just not enough. Not enough to choose me over whatever this was with her. Not enough to fight for us.
I take one last look at the man I've loved since I was old enough to understand the depth and weight of the word. I let my eyes rake down his body, memorizing and saying goodbye at the same time because I need to cleanse myself of him. The next time I allow myself to look into his eyes, they will hold nothing but hate.
I hate him for hurting me, for choosing her, for throwing away everything good between us. But I loathe him with every fiber of my being for destroying our family before it ever had a chance to begin. He didn't just close the door on us; he slammed it shut on our baby, on the tiny heartbeat I heard just hours ago, on the future we'll never have.
As I turn on my heel, I hear feet pounding against the wood floorboards, then Madison screeches, and the sickening sound of fist hitting bone echoes through the house.
"You fucking idiot!" Fisher's voice is raw with fury and heartbreak. "How could you?"
That's the last thing I hear as the door closes behind me with a finality that echoes in my chest. I leave Hale Ranch for the last time, carrying London's child and the shattered remains of a love that was supposed to last forever.
"Goodbye, London."
Chapter 32
LANEY
The rain soaked through my jacket ten minutes ago. I'm drenched and cold, yet here I stand, watching the water drip from my hair and pool at my feet onto the welcome mat. I want my mom—need my mom—but I'm scared to go inside, too afraid to face the suffocating memories these walls hold—the same ones I'm running from now.
My hand trembles as I reach for the doorknob, only to fall back to my side as my chest tightens with the ghost of a memory—London carrying me through this door the night I fell into the lake. Fuck. I knew this was going to hurt. I need my mom, but maybe running away to a place where no one knows my name would have been best, somewhere warm and tropical. My memories might still exist, but at least there, I wouldn't have reminders of him all around me, cutting open old wounds. How am I supposed to heal when I can't tell if the weight in my lungs is from a past that refuses to let go or the strength that comes from walking away?
The rain drums harder against the covered porch, each drop heavier than the last, out-thundering the rhythm of my heart. Through the living room window, I catch the soft glow of a lamp beside the couch. The light means she's home. She's not working ashift at the hospital, which means she's probably in the kitchen, brewing a pot of tea before curling up on the couch to read a book or catch up on one of her shows. Warmth floods through me. Memories of sitting beside her while I worked on my junk journals, catching up on our days, and sharing bowls of buttery popcorn during movie nights seep in, pushing out the pain and giving me hope, reminding me that it wasn't all bad. I just need to find the good. I have to find it now more than ever.
With a shaky breath, I raise my hand to open the door, but before my fingers can slide around the brass knob, it swings open, and there my mother stands in her faded blue robe, eyes wide in disbelief. For a heartbeat, we simply stare at each other in shock. Then recognition spreads across her face, quickly followed by relief and joy.
"Laney," she says my name like a whispered prayer, and in the next second, her arms are wrapping around my shoulders, pulling me close.
Her hold is fierce and desperate, as though she fears I might disappear if she doesn't hold me tight enough. It only takes seconds before my body collapses into her familiar warmth, finally allowing myself to be held by the woman I've missed more than I've dared to admit. Losing London broke me, but losing my mother nearly killed me.
"Come on, Laneybug. Let's get you dry clothes."
It's beenhours since my mother walked me to my room and took her time peeling away each piece of my rain-soaked clothing as if I were made of something precious and breakable. I felt like I was five again and sick with a fever, and she was there helping me into my soft pajamas. Part of me felt shame, needing her help in a semi-catatonic state, twenty-four years old and unable to remove my own clothes. However, accepting her help felt like its own kindof strength; it wasn't surrender. It was a courage I'd forgotten existed.
She never once asked why I'd shown up unannounced, soaked to the bone, with tear-filled eyes, on her doorstep. She didn't demand explanations or apologies. She simply did what mothers do—what my mother had always done—loved me unconditionally no matter the circumstance.
Now, lying in my childhood bedroom with rain still pattering against the window, I feel like the worst kind of asshole. For six years, I carried my anger like armor, nurturing every grievance and all my hurt. I'd convinced myself that because she chose to stay in Willow Creek, she was somehow a villain in my story and one of the reasons I had to stay away. But she'd been here all along, keeping my room exactly as I'd left it, loving the ghost of me while I tried to forget memories of this place, even the ones that included her. A realization settles, one impossible to ignore. I'd been so busy protecting myself from this town, from this house, from her that I'd never stopped to consider that she might have been protecting herself from losing me too.
