Page 6

CAL

She was shaking.

Not visibly. Not in the dramatic way people think of when they hear the word. But her fingers wouldn’t stay still. I watched them trying to clasp together, trying to hide the tremble in her palms. Not quite fear. More like a memory of it—older, quieter, worn soft from use.

And no one did a damn thing about it.

Not the man trying to undercut her. Not her father, who stood just close enough to see it all and just far enough to pretend he hadn’t.

I didn’t plan on being there. Or maybe I did. Maybe I just needed to be near, just in case.

Tiny coastal town. One road in, one out. A handful of garages, a handful more mouths. It wasn’t hard to figure out where she lived. I didn’t follow her. Didn’t track her. I just drove. A loop. That’s all.

But I wasn’t surprised when I saw her.

I was surprised she needed someone.

She doesn’t seem the type to ask. Doesn’t seem like she’s ever been given room to.

But the second I saw her out there, holding her own bike like a shield, trying to negotiate with someone who thought his ego could muscle her down... I didn’t think. I moved.

It wasn’t a choice.

It was muscle memory.

And now I’m behind the wheel, Chevelle humming steady beneath me, and the image keeps replaying.

Her voice when she said, “He was… a lot.”

Her hands, clasping, like she could will the shake out of them.

The motion caught me; not just because of the tremble, but because I wanted, instinctively, to cover them with mine.

To still them. To tell her, in the silence between us, that she didn’t have to hold herself together alone.

That someone saw her cracking and didn’t look away.

The way she looked at me. Like the weight had already lifted, and she didn’t know what to do with the lightness.

Something stirs in my ribcage—a pressure I haven’t felt in years, like a breath caught just shy of release.

Not anger. Not adrenaline.

Just the kind of sharp, protective ache that used to be second nature. The kind that says: mine to look after.

I don’t say that out loud. Not even to myself.

But it’s there.

She’s soft in a way most people aren’t anymore. Not fragile. Just… untouched by cruelty in a way that hasn’t fully broken her yet. But she’s braced for it. The kind of girl who flinches when kindness lands too close, as if she’s waiting for it to turn.

That’s what gets me, more than anything. The way she tried to thank me and apologize in the same breath. The way she called the buyer ‘a lot’ when what she meant was too much.

She never just asks. She justifies. Like she’s used to being questioned.

And her father just stood there.

Didn’t help. Didn’t step in. Didn’t come near.

That told me more than I needed to know.

Not just that he wouldn’t step in—but that he’d seen her struggle before and chosen silence.

The way his eyes slid past her, the way his shoulders stayed relaxed while hers curled inward.

It spoke of long practice. A man who’d made a habit of watching his daughter drown and offering nothing at all.

Not even discipline. Just disdain, cold and consistent, like it cost him nothing to write her off entirely.

No anger. No protection. Just that flat, uncaring absence she seems to have memorized.

I downshift as I crest the last rise before the turnoff to the ridge. The Chevelle grips the road like it knows the way by heart. I haven’t even touched the radio. The engine’s enough.

The cabin’s just ahead. I’ll get there and maybe chop some wood. Walk the line. Sharpen the axe even though it doesn’t need it. Habit. Not paranoia.

I need something to put my hands on.

Because there’s something about her that pulls at every piece of instinct I’ve spent years burying. Every protective reflex. Every quiet, watchful, steady piece of myself I tried to put down with the rest of it.

And she brings it all back without even trying.

She’s not mine. Not yet. But the way that word lingers— yet —settles under my skin like a promise I haven’t spoken aloud. Like something already half-claimed in the quiet spaces between us.

But someone ought to look out for her.

And right now, that someone is me.

The gravel crunches beneath the tires as I pull in. I cut the engine, and the silence that follows is the kind that settles into your chest. No birdsong. No wind. Just the low tick of metal cooling and the weight of what’s still clinging to me.

The cabin waits; dark wood warm in the late sun. It doesn’t ask anything of me. Never has. That’s why I built it the way I did. Tight seams. Clean angles. Enough off the road that no one finds it by accident.

But I don’t go inside.

Not yet.

I walk the perimeter first. Out of habit. Out of something older than routine. It isn’t paranoia. Not today. It’s a rhythm. A measure. A way to shake off what’s still lingering under my skin.

Every ten feet, I scan. Every tree, every shadow, every blind spot. I tell myself it’s unnecessary.

Then I think of her father’s face. Blank. Dismissive.

The way he didn’t even flinch when she stood there alone.

By the time I get back to the steps, the tension’s moved to my shoulders.

I grab the axe anyway.

The woodpile doesn’t need tending. But I do. I brace the first log on the stump, raise the blade, and bring it down in one clean motion. The crack echoes through the clearing. Sharp. Satisfying.

The rhythm is good. Swing. Split. Reset. It quiets the part of me that wanted to go back and say more. Do more.

Because the truth is, I used to live in that space—the space where being needed and being dangerous weren’t mutually exclusive. Where sharpness was just a tool in the belt.

But it’s been years since I used that part of myself for anything that mattered.

And then she walked into my life—unsteady, apologizing for existing—and lit up every protective reflex I thought I’d buried for good.

She doesn’t even realize she’s doing it.

The way she looked up at me when I handed her that mug like it might burn her. The way she said my name like she wasn’t sure she was allowed to.

Cal. Soft. Honest.

She’s small. Quiet. Careful. But not brittle. There’s steel in her, I saw it when she stood her ground even while shaking. And something about that makes me want to anchor it. Give her somewhere to lean. Somewhere no one can touch her.

She brings out a part of me I hadn’t reached for in years.

The part that doesn’t just protect.

The part that wants to keep. To wrap her in safety she doesn’t have to earn.

To be the one she doesn’t flinch away from.

To steady her hands when they tremble, to hold her gaze when she doubts her worth, to teach her in quiet, patient ways what it feels like to be protected just because.

Just because she exists. Just because I want to.

I don’t let the thought settle—not fully. But it’s there. Rooted. Slow and certain, like everything that lasts. If I let it grow, I know exactly where it would lead—to building a life with room for her at the center of it.

But I wait. I hold it. Because she needs to feel safe before she’ll ever believe she could stay.

She wouldn’t know what to do with that yet. Not the weight of it. Not the way I already think about clearing paths for her before she even walks them.

She’d call it too much. Or she’d flinch, like she does when kindness gets too close.

So I hold it.

Quietly. Completely.

Because this isn’t about rushing in. It’s about being there, over and over, until she starts to believe I’m not going anywhere.

I think about her on that bike. The way it fit her. How light she looked riding it, like the trail belonged to her.

How her hair curled damp around her face after she took off the helmet. How her eyes stayed wide the whole time, like she was waiting for the moment to turn sour.

It never did.

Not with me.

I keep splitting wood until the blade catches at the wrong angle and bites deeper than I meant.

I leave it in the stump and stand still, chest rising slow.

The image of her lingers: those wide, uncertain eyes, the slight tremble in her fingers, the way she held herself like no one ever had her back.

Splitting wood helped for a moment. A rhythm. A release. But now the quiet wraps back around me, and it presses into the space she left—sharp as breath in cold air, hollow in all the ways she isn’t. The ache doesn’t dull. It only roots deeper.

Not angry. Just full.

Of what, I’m not ready to say.

I glance toward the edge of the ridge. The trail that runs past the back of the cabin. I wonder if I’ll hear her pass again soon.

I hope so.

Hope’s soft. Doesn’t belong in a place like this, with a man like me. But I let it sit a while anyway.

And I leave the mug she drank from on the counter.

Unwashed.