Page 182 of When the Storm Breaks
Instead, he looks… fine.
Not untouched. Not like he hasn’t struggled. But nowhere near as wrecked as I imagined. Nowhere near as wrecked as heshouldbe.
It stings more than I want to admit—like maybe I was the only one drowning. Like time didn’t stop for anyone but me.
The light through the window is too bright. The air, too still. And I’m just standing there, staring at the man I used to love—the man I know I still do.
But I don’t have the energy for small talk or pleasantries.
“Tell me everything.”
He exhales, and for a second, I’m afraid he hasn’t changed. That he’ll shut down again. Bury it all.
But then he starts talking.
And I flinch at the sound of his voice.
“Jules and Willow were inseparable. Best friends, but opposites. I told you about Willow… she was all about work, about her dream. She just wanted that restaurant. And you knew Jules. She just wanted to have fun.”
His voice is tight, thick with regret.
“Jules pushed her out of her comfort zone all the time. My family loved her for it,” he says. “She got Willow to go to that party, which was huge. I don’t even think she wanted to be there.”
Something jagged and sharp slices through my chest.
In just a few sentences, he’s unraveling everything I thought I knew. Dismantling the version of the story I clung to like a life raft. It’s too far from what I needed to believe.
I want to stop him. Shut it down before everything falls apart.
But I don’t.
Because someone isfinallytelling me the truth.
“But she got overwhelmed. The alcohol wasn’t helping. She told Jules she wanted to leave—asked her to walk her back to the car.”
A cold pulse shoots through me, like my body figured it out before my brain did.
“They only made it halfway,” he continues, staring at a fixed point on the floor—like if he watches the grain of wood long enough, he’ll disappear into it. “Jules’s phone rang. It was Tyler—yelling, asking where she was, who she was with. So she pointed Willow toward the road… then she turned around and ran back to him.”
He drags a hand through his hair, pulling on the ends.
I stare at him, waiting for the part where he says he’s got it wrong. That it didn’t happen like this.
“Willow never even made it back to the car.”
The air goes still.
His face says everything his words don’t—the grief, the guilt, the knowing.
“There were parties out there all the time, but she never went. And you saw those woods, Calla. You know what it took to get there. It wasn’t her fault.”
The images I’ve been trying to push away flood back in. The twisted trees. The uneven terrain. The endless dark. The way the shadows swallowed everything whole.
“Jules told the police she walked Willow all the way back. Said she watched her drive off,” he says, voice quiet but steady. “But when they questioned Tyler a few days later, he said she was only gone a couple minutes. They did the math. It wasn’t enough time to get her to the car.”
He doesn’t say it right away—and I wish he wouldn’t at all. But I already know what’s coming.
“They brought her in again,” he says. “And she admitted it. She left Willow halfway. Just… let her go.”
