Page 36

MILLIE

I didn't think it would be this hard to watch someone else break.

I've sat in front of cameras, faced reporters who wanted to twist my every word into something cruel. I've read stories about myself that made my hands shake. I've stood under stadium lights, adrenaline in my throat, the weight of my family's legacy pressing into my spine.

But none of it—none of it—prepared me for the sound Harper makes when she thinks I'm not listening.

That soft, broken breath she lets out when she thinks she's being quiet.

That shudder that runs through her body while she pretends to be still.

The way her fingers twitch in mine like she's trying not to reach for something, and still needing to hold on.

I'm sitting in a stiff, plastic chair beside her while she leans against the hospital bed, forehead still touching her mother's hand like it's the only thing keeping her here. I don't move. I just sit with her. Be still with her. That's all I can do.

The machines beep in the background, slow and cruel, counting moments I wish we could pause. The lights overhead are too white, the air too cold.

I look at Harper again. The way she presses her mouth against her mother's knuckles. The way her whole body seems to curl inward, like if she could fold small enough, maybe this wouldn't hurt as much. Like maybe she could hide from it.

She hasn't said more than a few words to me since this morning. She doesn't need to. I know what she's saying with her silence.

I'm not okay.

Please don't go.

I can't do this alone.

And I won't leave her. Not now. Not when it really matters.

She looks so small like this. Like she's fighting to keep herself together and unraveling anyway. And the thing that guts me most is that she's still trying. Even now. Even with her heart shattered and her voice gone and her mom barely hanging on, Harper's still trying to be strong for everyone.

So I reach out. Just gently. I brush a hand through her hair, tucking a piece behind her ear. My fingers graze her cheek, and she leans into it without even realizing she's doing it. Her skin is warm and damp from crying.

"I ordered you some food," I whisper, even though I know she won't eat. "Just in case."

She doesn't respond. Doesn't look at me. But her fingers find mine again, and that's enough.

I glance over at the bed. Her mom's breathing is uneven. Shallow. Her skin pale and paper-thin, bruises blooming around the IV lines in her arms. But her eyes are open. Watching us.

"Millie," she croaks. My heart catches in my throat at the sound of my name in her voice.

I move closer. "Yeah. I'm right here."

Her eyes flick toward Harper, and then back to me. There's something behind them. A knowing. A quiet strength. And I feel it settle in my chest before she even says it.

"You take care of her," she rasps. "You don't let her carry this alone."

I nod, tears stinging behind my eyes. "I will."

She smiles—barely, but it's there. "You're good for her."

I glance at Harper, who's trying and failing not to cry again. "She's good for me too," I whisper, and I mean it. God, I mean it.

"She loves hard," her mom says, her voice barely a breath now. "Sometimes too hard. Be patient with that. Don't run."

"I won't." I swallow around the lump in my throat. "I promise."

She looks at Harper again, the softness in her gaze turning fierce with love. "You're my girl," she says. "Don't forget that and please don't stop loving just because I won't be here. You deserve to be love, Harper. You, my sweet girl, let yourself be loved. Don't shut down. I love you so much."

Harper sobs once, a sharp, involuntary sound. I reach for her, pull her into me, and she comes willingly this time. Her arms wind around my waist, her face buried in my chest. She's shaking again.

I hold her. I hold her so tight it feels like I'm trying to stitch her back together with my hands. My lips press to her hair. "I've got you," I whisper. "I'm not going anywhere."

The beeping of the monitors slows. Her mom's eyes flutter closed. And for a long moment, there's only silence.

Harper clings to me like she's drowning.

And I hold her like I mean every word I've ever said to her.

Because I do. Every single one.

She doesn't say anything, but her fingers dig into my shirt, and I think that's her way of saying thank you.

Of saying please don't stop. Of saying this hurts, and I don't know how to live without her.

And I think maybe—for the first time in my life—I understand what it means to love someone in the hard way.

In the quiet, painful, everyday way. The real way.

The way my moms love each other.

My sisters and their wives.

The love I grew up into.

She falls asleep like that—curled into me, small and trembling, her breath catching every so often like even in sleep, she's still crying.

My arms ache from holding her so tightly, but I don't let go.

I couldn't if I tried. I don't know how long we stay like that, how long I keep rocking her gently in the uncomfortable hospital chair, but I don't care.

I don't care that my back hurts or that my neck is cramping or that my eyes sting from crying silently beside her.

I watch her mom sleep, too. Or whatever this half-state is.

Not quite awake, not quite gone. A heartbeat away from the end.

And it's the cruelest thing I've ever witnessed.

She looks nothing like the pictures Harper used to show me on her phone when she pretended not to care.

Back then, it was always a joking, offhand comment—"That's my mom.

She's kinda intense, but she's funny as hell.

" Or, "She made me that cake for my birthday and burned it but said it was rustic.

" Harper used to light up when she talked about her, even when she was pretending not to.

Now her mom's chest rises and falls in slow, labored movements, and I feel helpless watching it.

I've never felt more useless in my life.

I've paid for every test, every treatment, every goddamn machine in this room, but none of it is enough.

Money can't fix this. Money can't undo cancer or grief or time.

It just buys you a slightly quieter room to fall apart in.

I glance down at Harper again. Her fingers are still curled tight in my shirt, like if she lets go, everything will fall apart.

I don't know if I've ever been someone anyone relied on like this.

Not really. My moms love me fiercely, and I love them back, but I've always been the strong one.

The steady one. The one who didn't need.

But with Harper, it's different. She's not asking me to fix it. She's not asking me to save her. She just needs me to stay.

I don't know how people survive this.

I sit there with Harper clinging to me, and all I can think—over and over, louder than anything else—is: what if it were one of mine? What if it were my mom in that bed?

It guts me. The thought alone makes my chest ache like something inside me is cracking open.

Because I can't imagine it. I can't imagine waking up in a world where one of them doesn't exist. My moms are everything.

They're loud and dramatic and a little overbearing sometimes, but they are home.

They're morning texts and late-night phone calls and warm food and soft sweaters and unconditional love.

They're where I go when I'm lost. They're the reason I know how to love anyone else at all.

And Harper's losing that. Right now. Inch by inch, breath by breath, she's watching her mother slip away from her, and there's nothing I can do but hold her through it.

I would give anything—anything—to make this easier.

To take even one ounce of the pain from her shoulders and carry it myself.

But I can't. So I just sit here, arms wrapped around her, while the room grows quieter and heavier with the weight of everything that's being stolen from her.

Harper doesn't cry in loud sobs. Not anymore.

She's beyond that now. This is the kind of grief that settles into your bones.

Quiet. Numb. Shaking. Her body jerks every once in a while, like a breath catches or her heart stumbles, but she doesn't make a sound.

She just presses herself closer to me, like maybe if she hides inside my arms, the world won't be able to touch her anymore.

I tighten my grip.

"I know, baby," I whisper against her hair. "I'm right here. I'm not going anywhere."

She still doesn't speak, but her fingers dig into my side just a little, like she heard me anyway.

I stare at her mom again, watching the shallow rise and fall of her chest. The way her lips part as she breathes through her mouth now.

The deep lines in her skin. I don't know how long she has.

None of us do. Maybe days. Maybe hours. But what I do know is that this woman loves her daughter so much it radiates from her even now.

It's in every glance, every effort to speak.

In the way she looked at me earlier—tired but sharp. Protective. Loving. A mom.

And she trusted me. With her daughter. With what comes after.

God.

I blink hard, eyes burning, throat tight. I don't know if I'm worthy of that. But I want to be.

Because I'm not pretending anymore. Not with this.

I don't know what Harper and I are right now.

We're fake-dating in headlines and very real in hospital rooms. We're not anything official, but she's everything in this moment.

She's soft skin and aching silence and the rawest kind of bravery I've ever witnessed.

She's losing her mother and still managing to breathe. She's still holding on.

So I will too. For her. Because she's not alone.

Not while I'm here.

────────── ???? ──────────

Harper hasn't said a word since we left the hospital.

She's in the passenger seat, curled in on herself like her body doesn't know what to do without her mother within reach. Like if she doesn't make herself small, the pain might tear her apart from the inside out.

I drive in silence, one hand steady on the wheel, the other occasionally reaching out to touch her knee, just to remind her I'm still here.

She doesn't pull away. She doesn't move.

She just stares through the window, past the empty parking lots and palm trees swaying too cheerfully in the humid wind.

It's late. The streets are quiet. It feels wrong that the world still exists.

They told us she can't stay overnight.

Something about infection risk and the ICU protocols, and I saw it—how Harper's face collapsed the second the nurse said it.

Her mom is dying, and they still sent her home.

Like time matters less because they're used to this.

Because it's just another shift. Another chart.

But to Harper, this isn't a chart. This is her mother. Her whole childhood. Her first protector. Her first home.

I want to scream for her. Break something. Demand they make an exception. But I didn't. I just took her hand and walked her out of the hospital, even though every step felt like a betrayal.

Back at the hotel, she moves like she's underwater. She goes straight to the bed, crawls under the blanket without even changing. I don't think she notices that her shoes are still on. I don't think she notices me.

I sit down beside her slowly. I don't touch her yet.

She's lying on her side, facing the window, watching nothing.

Her breath hitches quietly, and then again.

Her body starts to tremble, and still she doesn't cry out loud.

It's worse like this—silent grief. Grief that doesn't have the strength to scream.

It just seeps out of her like water through cracked stone.

"Hey," I whisper, finally placing a hand on her arm.

She doesn't look at me, but she moves just enough to let me in. So I lie down behind her, close but careful, my front to her back, one arm around her waist. My fingers brush the skin just under the hem of her borrowed tank top, where she's still warm from the heat of the day and heartbreak.

"She didn't want me to see her like this," Harper whispers. "That's why she told me to stop visiting."

I close my eyes, my chest tightening. "I know."

"She was always so proud. Always strong. God, Millie, she was so strong."

"You are too," I say, my voice barely steady.

She lets out something that's halfway between a laugh and a sob. "I don't feel strong. I feel like I'm disappearing."

I tighten my arm around her waist. "You're not. You're real. I'm real. I've got you."

We lie like that for a while, the hum of the hotel AC the only sound filling the room.

I stare at the ceiling and imagine what it would feel like to lose one of my moms. To get that call.

To stand next to a hospital bed and say goodbye to someone who held me every time I was sick or scared or stupidly heartbroken.

I can't. I can't even wrap my head around it.

Harper turns a little, just enough to look at me, eyes rimmed in red. "I don't know how to say goodbye to her. I don't know when to say it. I don't know what to say."

I reach up and push her hair out of her face, slow and gentle. "Say anything. Say nothing. Just hold her hand. That's enough."

"She told you to take care of me," she whispers, voice splintering. "I saw the way you looked at her. The way she looked at you. Like she knew something I don't."

I swallow hard. "She said... you were the best thing that ever happened to her. And she told me not to leave you alone."

Harper's eyes well again. "You won't, right? You won't leave me?"

I shake my head instantly. "Never."

She stares at me like she's trying to memorize that promise.

"I mean it," I say, voice breaking. "I don't care if we're still 'fake.' I don't care about the press or my Instagram or who's watching. I'm not going anywhere."

She exhales, a soft, painful sound, and presses her forehead against mine. We don't kiss. We don't need to. I just hold her, and she just breathes, and somehow that feels like the only honest thing we have left.

Harper falls asleep eventually, but it's the kind of sleep that looks like surrender—her jaw still tight, fingers curled into fists under her chin. She doesn't move. Barely even breathes. I stay awake beside her, curled around her like some kind of broken shield. My shirt is damp from her tears.

By the time the sky starts to shift from black to navy, I ease out of bed as gently as I can and step onto the little balcony outside. It's humid already, and quiet. The kind of quiet that feels too big. Like the world should be louder, or messier, or more on fire when someone is dying.

I sit on one of the chairs and press my forehead to my knees, just to try and hold all of it in—everything I felt when I saw Harper's mom for the first time. The fear. The devastation. The love, still hanging in the air like something you could hold.

God, she loved Harper. You could see it in the way she looked at her. Even with all the pain, even when her body was barely working anymore—her eyes found Harper like it was instinct. Like she'd been waiting for that moment all day. Maybe longer.

I hear the glass door slide open behind me. Harper's barefoot, wrapped in a blanket she must've pulled from the bed. Her eyes are puffy. Her cheeks blotchy. Her voice, when it comes, is quiet and raw.

"She used to pack my lunches in these little Tupperware boxes with notes written in marker on the lid."

I blink at her. "Yeah?"

She nods slowly, sitting down in the chair next to me. "They were always dumb. Like 'Don't forget to eat your fruit, or I'm calling the principal,' or 'Your mom loves you more than she loves cake.' That one was big because she really loved cake."

A soft laugh breaks in her throat, but it fades almost instantly.

"She made this apple cake every fall. Our whole house would smell like cinnamon and nutmeg and—god, this sounds so stupid—warmth.

Like actual warmth. I remember coming home from school in October and smelling it from the hallway and knowing it was going to be okay.

Even if I had a bad day. Even if everything else sucked.

She was there. And her cake was there. And that was enough. "

I don't speak. I don't interrupt. I just reach out and take her hand in mine.

"She used to talk to herself when she cooked.

Not like in a creepy way. Just... like she was narrating.

'Now the secret to good mashed potatoes is not being afraid of butter,' or, 'You think you need a recipe for French toast?

Just use your soul, Harper.'" She sniffs.

"It was so annoying. I miss it so much."

Her hand tightens around mine, like she's scared the memories will slip through her fingers if she doesn't grip hard enough.

"She never got mad when I cried. Not once.

Even when I was a mess. She always said it was braver to fall apart than pretend you're fine.

" Harper's voice cracks at that, her head tipping forward, shoulders trembling.

"She made me feel like I wasn't too much.

Even when I was. Even when I hated everything and lashed out and stayed out late and didn't call. She still loved me."

"She still does," I say gently.

Harper nods, barely. "But not for much longer."

I can't help it. I reach over, pull her into my arms again, and this time she just folds into me like she's exhausted every other option.

Her whole body sinks against mine—blanket tangled around her knees, her cheek pressed into the hollow of my collarbone, like maybe she can hide from the world there for just a second.

I hold her close, my arms wrapped tight around her, and I don't say a single word.

We sit like that for a long time. Just breathing. Just hurting. And then, soft and sudden, she whispers into my shoulder, "She liked you."

I freeze—not because I didn't expect it, but because I don't know how to carry the weight of a dying woman's approval. Not when I've only just figured out what Harper really means to me. Not when I feel like I've barely earned the right to hold her like this.

I pull back just enough to see her face. Her eyes are glassy, her lashes clumped with old tears. "Yeah?" I ask, barely above a whisper.

Harper nods slowly, swallowing hard. "She couldn't really talk much last night, but she kept.

.. watching you. She looked so tired but her eyes followed you everywhere.

She always knew when someone was good. And she—" her voice cracks, "—she said you were steady.

She said you were the kind of person who stays. "

The words wreck me.

I blink against the burn in my own throat, try to hold it together, but I feel the tears coming anyway. Because she's right. I am the kind of person who stays. And I will. For as long as Harper lets me.

Harper's hand finds mine, fingers trembling. "She said you look at me like I hung the moon," she whispers, not even looking at me when she says it. "I didn't know what to say. I—I don't even know what we are. But she saw it. She saw you."

My chest caves in a little. I look at her, really look at her, and I see it too—the way she's trying so hard to be brave, the way she's unraveling in pieces and still showing up, still holding on. And I think maybe her mom wasn't wrong.

I do look at her like she hung the moon.

"Harper," I breathe, her name a prayer on my lips. "I'm not going anywhere. Not now. Not after this. Not ever unless you ask me to."

Her face crumples. "I don't want to lose her."

"I know," I say, brushing her hair back behind her ear, my fingers trembling. "I know, baby."

She breaks at that. The word. The softness of it.

The way I say it like I've said it a hundred times before.

She falls apart in my arms, crying so hard she shakes.

And I just hold her through all of it, rocking her gently even though I'm crying too.

Because I can't imagine it either. I can't imagine losing a mom.

I've never known that kind of fear. That kind of loss.

But I see it in Harper. I see it hollowing her out. I see it eating her alive.

And all I want is to protect her from it.

To take it away. But I can't. So I hold her instead.

I kiss the top of her head. Her temple. The corner of her damp cheek.

I tell her it's okay to cry. I tell her she's not alone.

I tell her I'll be right here. And somewhere in all of that—somewhere between the salt and the silence—she starts to come back to me. Just a little. Just enough.

"Millie?" she says, broken and soft.

"Yeah?"

She leans back just enough to meet my eyes. There's something in her expression that feels like grief, but also like... surrender. Like maybe she's starting to believe I mean it when I say I'm staying. "I'm really glad it's you," she whispers.

And I feel it. All of it. The weight of what she's carrying. The size of what she's trusting me with.

So I don't say anything clever. I don't make a joke or change the subject. I just take her hand again, press my lips to her knuckles, and whisper, "Me too."

We sit there until the sun comes up. And even then, neither of us lets go.