Page 84 of The Weight of Her Silence
“You stayed… and I took that for granted. I thought I had time. To fix it. To be better. But time ran out, and I didn’t even know you were dying.”
The tears fell then, quiet and slow.
“I would give anything—anything—to go back and sit with you when you cried behind the bathroom door. To hold your hand when you couldn’t sleep. To ask you how you were really doing and stay to listen. I should’ve done all of that. I should’ve done so much more.”
His hands trembled as he pulled a folded piece of paper from his pocket. It wasn’t a letter—he had no more words to leave behind. It was a drawing. Caleb had made it last night, a picture of their family, stick figures and crooked hearts. Lila stood in the middle, smiling.
“I thought I lost everything when I lost you,” Nate whispered. “But I still have them.Ava. Caleb. And I swear to you… I’m going to be there for them now.
Every morning. Every hard day. Every moment they need someone to show up—I’ll be there. I’ll be the kind of father they don’t have to question.”
He pressed the drawing gently against the headstone, anchoring it with a small stone.
“I can’t fix the past,” he said, voice breaking. “But I’ll fight like hell for what’s left of the future.”
The wind stirred again, soft and warm against his face.
For a second—just a breath of time—he imagined she was there. Standing beside him. That familiar warmth in her eyes, the quiet forgiveness in her smile. And maybe, just maybe, she heard him.
Nate rose slowly, brushing the grass from his knees. He looked down at the grave one last time and placed a kiss against his fingers, then touched them to her name.
“I’ll take care of them, Lila,” he whispered. “I promise.”
Then he turned, and for the first time in a long while, he walked forward without dragging the past behind him.
Chapter 51
What Time Couldn’t Heal
Time moved forward, the way it always does—without permission. The seasons changed in muted colors. Winters came and went, cold and silent. Springs bloomed with a little less joy. The house had settled into a quieter rhythm, a different kind of normal, one that didn’t quite feel whole. Lila’s absence became a presence of its own—an echo in the hallway, the softness missing from birthdays, the silence at dinner.
Three years had passed.
Ava was packing her things.
Her bedroom, once covered in posters, poetry, and photographs, was now half-empty. Books were in boxes. Clothes folded with more method than sentiment. Her acceptance letter to Columbia sat pinned neatly above her desk, pride and ache layered in its crisp white envelope.
Caleb hovered in the doorway, arms crossed, trying not to look like this was goodbye.
“You sure you don’t want help with those?” he asked.
Ava glanced over her shoulder, offering him a tired smile. “I’m fine. You packed all of yours last week.”
“I still have some stuff to do,” he muttered, avoiding her gaze.
Caleb would be going to Berkeley. A full ride. Bright and sharp like his mother—quietly so, in the way people didn’t expect. He’d grown taller, broader, but his voice still softened when he spoke to Ava. She was his anchor.
They had become each other’s safe place in a world that shifted underneath them.
Their father still lived in the same house. Still made breakfast most mornings. Still tried.
But things had changed.
Nate loved his children deeply—desperately—but a distance had grown between them. Not from anger, not anymore. Just… time. Pain. Memory. It clung to their conversations like fog. There were no shouting matches. No cold shoulders. Just shorter hugs. Shorter calls. Fewer questions.
Some cracks weren’t loud. They simply grew in silence.
Ava closed the last box and sat on the edge of her bed, brushing her hair back as Caleb joined her.
