Climbing out from where it had rotted and decayed. From the deepest, most sinister place. From that place that would whisper its menace in her ear, tell her she was going to lose everything that meant the most to her.
It was the first time she believed it might speak the truth.
E-V-A-N.
She rushed into the hospital room.
He was breathing.
Alive.
Whole.
She dropped to her knees at his bedside.
Sobbing and sobbing and sobbing.
Because she couldn’t control it anymore.
She was weak.
Losing the battle.
“Oh God,” she whimpered, pressing her face into his arm, fingers digging into his skin, inhaling him, wanting to crawl on top of him and hug him tight and beg him to never leave her alone.
She wanted to attach herself to him in some fundamental way. Seep into his bloodstream and heal all that was wrong. Do it for their child who would never know what it was like to run and play.
“I can’t, Evan, oh God, I can’t.”
A swell of sickness slammed her, and fumbled for the trash bin next to his bed, and she puked up the little that was in her stomach.
No longer able to keep it together.
No longer able to keep herself from fallin’ apart.
He reached for her.
Squeezed her hand.
So much sorrow in his expression. Green eyes overflowing with an apology.
“I’m sorry,” he said, brushing his thumb across the tears soaking her cheek. “I am sorry, Frankie.”
She kept weeping, unable to stop.
“I can’t, Evan. I can’t,” she was rumbling, tears a blanket down her face, wanting to tell him about the baby but unable to force the words from her tongue. “I can’t.”
Evan pulled her close, ran his fingers through her hair, pressed a kiss to the top of her head. “It’s okay.”
But it was so, so not okay.
Frankie Leigh.
My Sunshine.
My Unicorn Girl.
I am the most selfish man. I’ve been taking what I never should have. Stealing more time than I should have been given.
But I saw it today.
I saw that look on your beautiful face.
I saw more pain than any person should have to suffer.
I saw the childless.
I saw a widow.
I saw a life of unreasonable sorrow.
I can’t be responsible for that. I can’t hold you back. I can’t stand in your way.
Loving you will always be my greatest treasure.
Letting you go my greatest pain.
Soar to the stars, Unicorn Girl. And don’t ever, ever let anyone clip your wings. I won’t let that be me, anymore.
Evan
Clutching the letter to her chest, Frankie Leigh dropped to her knees.
Finally conquered by the pain.
Nothing left to give.
No hope left.
“Evan. Evan. Evan. I need you. Oh God, I need you.”
She whimpered his name again and again. Praying for him to come back to her. To wrap her up and tell her it would be all right. To remind her where they had been written in the stars. Her constellation.
Emptiness howled.
Vacancy echoed back.
Frankie Leigh alone. Abandoned. The way Evan had warned.
Only he was the one who chose it.
When she awoke in the middle of the night, she knew. It was the quietest kind of heartache. The kind she waded through slowly. The kind that hitched her soul up in a surrendered sort of agony.
The stillness that echoed inside of her.
The little soul she could no longer feel.
Tears streamed silently down her face, everything numb except for her heart.
Her mind and her spirit and her body that felt like they had floated out into the universe, chasing after what was lost.
She didn’t change out of her pajamas. She just slipped into her flipflops, took her purse, and eased out the door.
She moved right toward Evan’s parents’ house.
She’d crossed that road a million times.
But tonight—tonight the sky was starless.
As if all the constellations had fallen.
Pure darkness taking its place.
She rapt at the door, listened to the creak of the stairs and squinted when the porch light flickered on overhead. Her uncle Kale slowly opened the door.
He looked like he’d aged fifteen years in the six weeks since Evan had left.
Depression taking hold.
Frankie couldn’t even bring herself to look in the mirror.
Couldn’t bring herself to see the hollowness staring back.
“Frankie,” he murmured urgently.
She set her hand on her belly, and she whispered, “She’s gone.”
She’d thought that maybe she could handle it all.
Had thought maybe she was strong enough.
But that splintered Heart of Stone that couldn’t be broken?
It finally completely split in two.
Thirty-Two
Evan
I dropped to my knees.
Reduced to a puddle of tears and heartbreak and apology.