Page 158 of The Compass Series

DAMIAN

W atching Stella on bedrest was the hardest thing to witness. Not because she was unable to move as she wished, but because she was stuck in such a mindset of despair. She hadn’t allowed her mind to rest at all, and her light was gone.

I wished I could bring it back to her. I wished I could wrap up her pain and push it deep into my own chest. People like her were not meant to hurt like this. She was pure and didn’t deserve to know this type of darkness.

She wasn’t meant to suffer.

“I’ve lost everything that meant the most to me,” she whispered, exhaustion sitting heavily against her eyelids.

She hadn’t been sleeping well, and I couldn’t blame her, but still, I wanted her to rest her eyes.

I wanted her to unplug from the wildness of her mind.

I wanted to take her suffering and place it against my own soul.

“First my mama, then Kevin, my previous pregnancies…now I might lose my baby…it hurts, Damian,” she said, trembling in my grip. “It hurts to breathe.”

“I’m so sorry, Stella. But the baby’s okay…everything’s going to work out.”

“You don’t know that for sure.”

She was right…but I needed everything to work out. I didn’t think she would survive if it didn’t.

She snuggled closer to me as I held on to her for dear life.

She finally shut her eyes and lay her head against my chest. “Promise me you’ll stay,” she said, buried so deep against me that I wasn’t even sure where I began and where she ended.

“Promise me you’ll be here in the morning and then beside me at night. ”

“I promise you.”

“Forever?”

“And ever.”

She fell asleep, and I kept making that promise repeatedly in my head.

“I’m worried about her,” I told Maple as I sat at her dining room table, drinking disgusting tea. March and April were the months of heartache. Watching Stella struggle with herself, living in a constant state of fear, was the most heart-shattering pain I’d ever witnessed.

“She will come around. It takes time,” Maple swore, gently patting my hand to give me comfort. Comfort that I wished I could’ve transferred to Stella’s soul.

“Yes, but it’s been weeks, and she hasn’t been herself. I don’t know how to help her. I don’t know how to help pull her back to herself.”

“Sweetheart…” Maple sighed and gave me a broken smile. “After such scary news, it takes time. So maybe the real question is, how okay are you with her not being who she once had been until this pregnancy is over?”

“Every version of her is the one that I love. If this is her, then I will love this version. But I just wish she could do her artwork. I wish she could still talk to the ocean.”

It had been weeks, and Stella hadn’t gone to the ocean.

I’d asked her each morning if she’d like me to join her, but she denied the invitation.

“The water healed her in the past,” Maple said, stirring her tea. “But now she feels as if the world has betrayed her. Either that or she feels as if she doesn’t deserve to heal. If I know Stella, then I know she blames herself.”

“What can I do to help her?”

“Oh sweetheart, that’s easy. Just stay. Trust me,” she said, growing somber and looking out of her window toward the water. “She’s going to need you for this next chapter.”

“What is it?” I asked, not speaking about her words but about her stare. It was clear that something was sitting heavily on Maple’s chest. “Remember? I’m good at reading people.”

“It’s just…I worry, too. There will be a day when I’m no longer around, and I worry about Stella’s heart.

So, if any part of you feels as if you might run…

if any part of you that thinks you can’t handle this, I need you to speak up now.

Otherwise, I’m fearful that Stella may end up alone, and I’m not certain she can handle that. ”

My brows knitted as I took in her words. “Did you know? About the will?” I asked, breaking into the subtext behind her words. “Did you know about the arranged marriage?”

She looked at me and nodded. “Yes. I did. Kevin asked me to help once he found out about your existence. We both knew that Stella struggled with trusting her own voice, and when she found out Kevin was sick, I was watching her mind decline. Then Kevin came up with the idea of the arranged marriage, so she would have someone good in her life, unlike Jeff.”

“That’s ridiculous, though. How could you both know that I would be any good for her?”

She smiled, took my hand into hers, and patted it.

“Kevin was unable to travel last year. So when we tracked you down, I flew out to New York and found you. You were looking after your friend Aaliyah, and I saw it, the softness in your soul. I remember thinking to myself that if Stella ever found real love, I’d hoped it would be with a man like that.

A man who stayed even when it was dark outside.

Yes, it’s easy to love and care within the sun, but real love shows up strongest when the clouds move in and fear is ignited.

Real love shows up during the highest of tides, and still, it stays. ”

I grimaced, taking it all in. I felt so much confusion as Maple revealed this news to me. I felt lost in my spiraling thoughts. “So…you were behind all of this? Putting Stella and me together?”

“Yes. And I’m sorry if this is a lot for?—”

“Maple.”

“Yes, Damian?”

I cleared my throat and fought my tears. “Thank you.”

It was because of her that I discovered love.

She smiled and patted my hand in hers. “Always.”

“I’m going to go check in on her, see if she needs anything,” I said, standing from the table. As I began to walk away, I paused, and looked back at Maple. “I do have one question, though.”

“Shoot.”

“If you helped Kevin set this arrangement up, does that mean you know who my mother is?”

“I do, and I was instructed to tell you after the six months were up, but sweetheart”—she gave me that warm Maple smile that she was known for—“I think you truly already know, too. You know, I’m good at reading people with all of this, as you called it, mumbo jumbo, but you’re good at reading people, too. How do you do it, Damian?”

“What do you mean?”

“How do you read people?”

I lowered my brows as I brushed my hand against my chin. “It’s their eyes,” I said.

“Yes.” She nodded. “You see their souls through their eyes.”

I went to the ocean. I didn’t know what I was doing or how to talk to it, but I tried. I knew Stella needed some form of healing, and truthfully, I was willing to try any and everything.

I talked to Kevin. I talked to the goddess that Maple mentioned, placing flowers into the water. But mostly, I talked to Sophie.

Stella’s mother never knew me. She never knew my name or the love I had for her daughter.

She’d never shake my hand or hold me in an embrace.

But if there was a God, and if the ocean really did hold Stella’s mother’s heartbeats, I needed to talk to her.

I needed her to fix this, to heal her daughter.

To tell me what I needed to do to make this better.

As I walked into the water, I prayed. I was probably shit at it, too, but I begged Sophie to watch over Stella.

I begged her to not only be in the ocean with her love but also in the sand and in the air.

In Stella’s heartbeats. I begged her to protect her from the other side, to love on her when Stella felt unloved.

To never truly leave her side, even during the dark days.

Especially during the dark days.

I stayed in the water for hours. The day transitioned to night as I asked for Sophie’s help.

“Hi, Sophie. I know you don’t know me, but this is for Stella.

I just need you to…” I took a deep breath.

“Fix her. Fix this. Protect Stella and the baby. Make sure they’re both okay.

Make sure they both make it out of this.

That’s all I’m asking. If you need a soul, take mine.

Take me, Sophie. But please…” I whispered, my voice cracking. “Don’t take my girls.”

I immersed myself in the water. I lost myself in the waves. Then I prayed that the ocean could truly heal Stella for me. That was my greatest, and only wish.