Page 49 of Remain
As the afternoon fades,things wind down on their own. Lists are checked off, boxes stacked neatly, and the room empties slowly, people lingering in small clusters like they’re reluctant to leave something that feels good to be part of.
Outside, the square glows in the soft light of summer.
Erik and I step out together, the air warm and inviting, and he slows near the gazebo, the same place where everything once felt unfinished.
“You look settled.”
“I feel… aligned,” I answer. “I didn’t give anything up.”
He smiles, soft and certain. “I know. It looks good on you.”
We stand there for a moment, history humming quietly between us, two kids who loved the same place, two adults who learned how to carry it differently.
“She’d be proud of you, Savannah. So proud.”
“I think she’d be relieved,” I reply. “That I finally stopped trying to choose.”
His hands come to my waist and mine wrap around his neck and when we kiss, it’s unhurried and sure. There is no fear and no rush, only the quiet understanding that what we have fits naturally into the life we’re building, exactly as it is.
Later,back at Aunt Carol’s, I sit at the kitchen table with my laptop open, notes spread around me, my mother’s notebook resting beside my tea.
I trace my finger along her handwriting, the loops and margins filled with thoughts she never meant to polish, only to remember. I can almost hear her then, not as a memory butas something closer, steadier, like she’s standing just behind me, patient as ever.
Don’t overthink it, Sav.
Just tell the truth.
I add one final line beneath her notes.
— Love works best when it’s shared.
The words sit there, simple and certain, and I understand that they aren’t advice or legacy or even belief. They’re instruction. The kind she lived by without ever saying out loud.
In New York, my life is there, waiting for me.
In Pineview, something meaningful is growing.
I can almost feel her hand at my back, dependable and sure, like she always trusted I’d find my way.
For the first time, I don’t feel split.
I feel whole.
EPILOGUE
Erik
Pineview teachesyou how to wait without feeling left behind.
I used to think staying meant standing still. If you didn’t leave where you came from, you were somehow choosing less, but time does different things to you when you stop measuring it by what you’re missing and start measuring it by what keeps returning if you let go and trust.
Savannah returns and often. Most importantly, she returns by choice. She arrives with schedules, return flights already booked, calendars synced, and ideas half-formed that turn whole once she says them out loud. She comes with her mother’s notebook in tow, the pages worn soft from being opened again and again. She comes with New York City still in her bones and Pineview still in her heart.
She never apologizes for either. She never should. They are the two sides of her that make her whole.
Some nights she stays with Aunt Carol, the house loud again in a way it hasn’t been for years. Other nights, more often now, she stays with me.
Those nights are quiet in the way that matters. The nights that fuel me when she’s back in the Big Apple.