“Logan…” My voice cracks, and I swallow the lump in my throat. “I can’t believe I’m home.”
“Me neither,” he whispers back. “But you are. And I’m right here.”
The world feels like it’s slowing down as I step out of the car, the gravel crunching underfoot, the house looming in front of me. And for the first time since everything changed, I feel like maybe I can breathe again. Maybe I can start to put the pieces back together.
I take a deep breath and turn to Logan, meeting his steady gaze.
“You ready?” he asks.
I nod, my heart racing in my chest. “Yeah.”
Together, we walk up the path to the porch. The house, the memories, the ghosts of what used to be—they’re all waiting for me.
But I’m not alone anymore.
We stop at the bottom step of the porch.
I stare up at the old white house—the one with the crooked wind chime still clinking softly in the breeze.
My lungs draw in the scent of salt and woodsmoke.
Beside me, Logan’s hand is warm and steady in mine. He’s quiet, letting me take it all in.
“I used to sit right there,” I murmur, pointing to the edge of the porch. “Braden and I… we’d eat Popsicles and argue over whose turn it was to pick the cassette. You were always there, too. You'd sit between us and pretend to be Switzerland.”
Logan laughs under his breath, a low, warm sound that does something to my heart.
“You two were nightmares,” he says. “And don’t act like I didn’t get caught in the middle of every war. Braden was ruthless when it came to his music.”
“So were you,” I say, nudging him lightly. “You both had awful taste.”
“Lies,” he grins. “Pure slander.”
I laugh, the sound half-choked by tears that rise too fast. The ache hits, sudden and sharp, but this time… it’s not all pain. There’s sweetness buried in it. Memory. The kind that hurts in the best way.
I turn to look at Logan.
He’s already watching me.
His blue eyes are glowing in the last light of the day, like they soaked up every sunset we ever sat through together. The boy who grew up across the street. The boy who became my everything—before I even knew what everything was.
He lifts my hand to his lips and presses a kiss to my knuckles.
“I missed you,” he says. “The way you see the world. The way you bring it back to life just by stepping into it.”
“This house… this street… they were just places without you, Mac. But now that you’re here, everything’s right again.”
My chest tightens.
I don’t know what I did to deserve this kind of love. But standing here with him, on the steps of our past and the edge of our future, I feel it. All of it.
And this time, I don’t run from it.
I reach for the doorknob, the key shaking in my hand as I unlock the front door like I have a thousand times before.
The door creaks open on a sigh, like it remembers me.
My hand tightens in Logan’s, grounding myself in the warmth of his skin as the familiar scent hits me—lavender, old wood, and something faintly sweet. It smells like Braden’s cologne. Like safety. Like a thousand yesterdays.
