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Chapter Twenty-Eight

Michele

I slam the bathroom door behind me and twist the lock with trembling fingers.

Click.

That tiny sound echoes like a gunshot in my ears—final, thin, barely holding back the tidal wave inside me.

I stumble back and press against the small vanity, my spine hitting the wood. It’s cold as I suck in a breath—too fast and shallow. My lungs won’t work. It feels like I’m breathing through a straw, like my ribs are bound in barbed wire, tightening with every panicked gasp.

The room tilts slightly, edges blurring as the floor sways in front of me. I’m panicking, I know it, but I’m helpless to stop it. I drop to the tile, curling into a tight ball as I bring my knees to my chest, arms locking around me as I try to hold myself together. I’m small again, invisible, trying to disappear into the grout lines. The tile is cool beneath me, grounding and merciless.

The towel from yesterday still hangs limply on the hook. The smell of my shampoo clings to the air, clean and soft—too gentle a scent for how violently I’m unraveling. A sob claws its way out of my throat as the sound of Cole’s voice comes through the wood—low, pleading, broken.

“Michele, baby. Please—open up. Talk to me.”

I curl tighter into myself. Not because I’m scared of him. Not exactly. I know Cole, but that rage , the way his voice roared and his body swelled like he was barely holding himself back—it felt like something ancient and dangerous. Something I couldn’t reach. And it cracked something open in me I’ve kept sealed for a long, long time.

I was eight the day I found my mother. I had walked home from school, having waited over an hour for my mother to arrive.

“Mama. Are you sleeping?” I yelled, but the house remained silent. No TV. No radio. Just the ticking clock above the fireplace and the hiss of the heater turning on.

“Mama?” I call again, dropping my backpack by the door and heading toward the stairs.

I wandered from room to room until I reached the bathroom. The door was open just enough for me to see the tip of her foot on the floor. I pushed the door open and found her slumped against the tub. Eyes open, but glassy. A silence so thick it rang in my ears. Pill bottles were scattered across the floor—some still spinning lazily, like they hadn’t yet realized time had stopped.

I remember the color of the pills. Light blue and white. Like little pieces of sky and snow. I remember screaming. But no one came.

I press my fists into my eyes, digging into the sockets like I can shove the memory back into its coffin. But it’s too late. The lock’s broken. Every slammed door, every raised voice thick with anger, turns me into that barefoot little girl again, watching the world end with no one to stop it.

“Don’t leave me in the dark,” Cole says from the other side of the door, voice cracked and rough. “I don’t know how to fix this if you don’t open the door.”

He sounds like he’s crying. I close my eyes, swallowing down the lump in my throat. Not just from the panic, but from the sheer weight of it all. My father, his cruelty. His words still echo in my head.

She’s making the same mistake I did, falling for her mother. Ruining everything she’s worked her whole life toward for someone who can never put her first. Who will always put the pills before her until the day she finds him dead on the floor. Just like she did with her mother .

I know it’s not true, but fear doesn’t care about facts. It wraps around old wounds like vines, squeezing until you can't see the truth anymore. I bite down a sob and slide closer, dragging myself forward inch by inch. My fingertips graze the base of the door, as if touching it can tether me back to now.

“Cole,” I whisper. My voice is barely there. “I’m here.”

There’s a soft thump as his forehead rests against the other side. The silence that follows is thicker than before—quiet, but aching.

“I’m sorry,” he breathes. “I should’ve told you about the pills. About everything. I didn’t want to scare you. I didn’t want you to look at me the same way you looked at him. He shouldn’t have spoken to you like that.”

“You don’t,” I say, because I need him to hear it. “I would never look at you like that. But you… You scared me, Cole. Not because I think you’d hurt me. But because I’ve seen what those pills can do. The uncontrollable anger and mood swings, the depression and lack of will to live. I’ve seen all of it. I’ve lived with it. I’ve lost to it.”

“I would never hurt you,” he says, voice raw. “But I hurt you anyway, didn’t I?”

My throat tightens, and I can’t speak, but I nod, even though I know he can’t see it.

“I love you,” he says. “And I think I fucked everything up.”

My heart fractures at the honesty in his voice. At the grief tangled up in it, but beneath that grief, I hear something else. Fear. The kind that lives in your bones when you realize you’ve already lost what matters most. And that —not the shouting, not the fists against walls, not the broken glass—that’s what makes my fingers tremble toward the lock. Because I’m scared, too, but I won’t let fear be the only thing we have in common.

Click.

I pull open the door and find Cole sitting on the floor, legs sprawled, back braced against the wall like it’s the only thing holding him up. His knuckles are red, his eyes rimmed darker. His whole body looks like it’s caved in on itself.

“I’m not okay,” I whisper.

“I know,” he says softly. “Me neither.”

I sink down beside him. He doesn’t touch me. He waits until I lean into him, resting my head on his shoulder, and he threads his fingers through mine. No demands. No pressure. Just being there for each other.

And for the first time since the shouting started, I let myself breathe.

* * *

When I open my eyes, the apartment glows. Morning light spills across the hardwood, warm and soft. The kind that makes everything feel gentler than it really is. I don’t move at first. I just breathe.

Cole’s arm lies heavy over my waist, his fingers slack against my stomach. His chest rises and falls against my back in a slow, even rhythm, but I remember what his breathing sounded like in the dark—ragged, like every inhale cost him something as he pleaded for me to come out of the bathroom. I don’t think I’ll ever forget it.

Neither of us said much after I came out of the bathroom. Words felt too sharp, like they’d cut us if we tried to hold them. So we didn’t. We just collapsed into each other, curled up on the couch like shipwreck survivors clinging to the same piece of driftwood. Later, we found our way to bed without even undressing, too drained to do anything but hold each other close.

Now, in the quiet aftermath, the world feels muffled. Like it’s wrapped in cotton. My body aches in that dull, wrung-out way that follows nights spent crying, shaking, remembering too much, but my chest doesn’t feel like it’s caving in anymore. And that’s something.

I shift slightly, just enough to look up at him. His face is turned toward me, hair messy, jaw rough with stubble. There’s a furrow between his brows even in sleep, like his body can’t quite let go, like some part of him is still waiting for the next blow.

He stirs in my arms as I reach up, smoothing that crease away with my thumb.

“You okay?” he murmurs, voice low and gravelly from sleep.

“I don’t know. You?”

His hazel eyes open, still storm-touched, but quieter now. Like the waves have calmed, even if the tide hasn’t gone out yet. “Not really, but I’m better with you here.”

The words land with the weight of truth. Not shiny or romantic, just raw. My throat tightens as I press a kiss to his shoulder, a quiet promise before lying back down and snuggling into his side..

We stay quiet a little longer before I speak again. “I want to call him my dad. He needs to hear me choose you.”

Cole stiffens, his breath faltering before he exhales through his nose. “You don’t have to. Not for me.”

“I do.” I sit up, finding my phone on the nightstand. “Because he won’t ever change. But I have.”

I stare at it for a second, heart hammering in my chest as I scroll to Dad and hit call before I can lose my nerve.

He answers on the second ring, his voice gruff because he’s probably expecting an apology. “Michele.”

“I’m staying with Cole,” I say before he can say anything else. My voice is clear. Steady. “I love him.”

A pause. Then a scoff. “After everything I told you?—”

“I know who he is and what he’s done. But I also know who I am when I’m with him. And I’m not walking away from that.”

“You’re throwing away your career.”

“No,” I say, jaw tightening. “You’re the one who threw something away last night. You chose pride and anger over your daughter.”

His silence is louder than shouting.

“If you make me choose,” I say, voice barely above a whisper now, “I’ll choose him every time.”

“You’ll regret this,” he spits.

I don’t flinch. I don’t fight. I just hang up. My hand falls to my lap, shaking, tears stinging behind my eyes, but underneath all that, there’s a clarity I haven’t felt in years.

Cole is sitting up now, watching me with cautious eyes. “You chose me.”

I crawl back into his arms and rest my forehead against his chest. His hand comes up, strong and shaking, to cradle the back of my head. “I’m not afraid of your past.”

His breath catches, pulling me closer like he’s afraid I’ll vanish if he lets go.

“My mom died in the bathroom,” I whisper. “When I was eight. Pills. Prescription. I think that’s why last night… why I reacted the way I did.”

His arms tighten as he presses his lips to the top of my head. “Thank you for telling me.”

“I don’t want to run from things anymore.”

He nods, his voice barely audible. “Then we won’t. Not alone.”

I bury my face in his chest, and for the first time in a long time, I let myself believe we might actually be strong enough to build something out of the wreckage.

Together.