Strings of Fate: The First Loop

CHAPTER 33

I looked down. Shame flooded my chest, hot and cold all at once.

“You left me when I needed you…” he said again, slower, more broken. “You said… you said…”

But he couldn’t finish. The words collapsed in his throat, and he covered his face, his whole body shaking as the tears came, sudden and raw.

I moved closer, slowly. Sat down beside him on the edge of the bed where the sheets were twisted like he had fought battles in his sleep. I didn’t reach for him yet. I needed him to know I wasn’t just sorry. I was responsible.

“I know,” I whispered. “I said I’d stay. I said I’d fight for you. And I meant it, James… I really did. B-but the pressure of the whole world telling me to run awayf got the best of me, t-then I heard these stories... unknows tales of your kindness, of your generousity, of you fighting and protecting others, that's when I realized how wrong I am... and I want to apologize for what I did baby.... I'm really sorry.”

“Then why?” His eyes met mine, and they weren’t angry. Just… betrayed. “Why did you need evidences that I was good before you believed it?”

That question hit me harder than any scream ever could.

“I think…” I started, voice barely breath, “I think I let the noise get too loud. I let the world narrate you. I saw the light in you, I always did, but when it got dark, I stopped trusting my own eyes.”

I reached for his hand. Cold. Unmoving. But he didn’t pull away.

“I wanted proof,” I said. “And I hate that. I hate that I made you feel like you needed to earn what should’ve been yours. My belief in you.”

He blinked back more tears. Silent. Listening.

“I think… it’s part of being human,” I said. “Sometimes we think love should come with evidence. But real love… the kind that stays… it believes even when there’s no proof. It fights even when it’s inconvenient. And I didn’t. I failed.”

He closed his eyes.

“I’m not asking you to forget what I did,” I whispered. “I just want a chance to remember who we were, before the noise. Before the world told us what to believe.”

Stillness. Then, slowly, his fingers curled around mine.

“I’m tired,” he said. “Tired of proving I’m not who they think I am.”

“You don’t have to,” I answered. “Not to me. Not anymore.”

He didn’t speak again, but he leaned into me, forehead against my shoulder, and for the first time in days, he let himself be held.

He rested his forehead against my shoulder, and for a long while, we just stayed like that. Breathing. Breaking. Rebuilding, not with grand declarations, but with silence that finally felt safe.

His body felt smaller in my arms, like the weight of everything had collapsed him inward. I could feel the stubble against my cheek, the uneven rhythm of his breath as he tried to steady himself. I didn’t try to rush it. Grief has its own pace. So does healing.

“I didn’t know how to reach you,” I whispered, fingers brushing his hair back gently. “I kept calling. I kept hoping. But maybe I needed to come here… not as someone who needed answers, but as someone who’s finally ready to listen.”

He didn’t answer, but his hand, still in mine, gave the smallest squeeze. It was enough.

We sat on his bed, back pressed against the wall, knees folded to our chests like kids hiding from the thunder. The room smelled like the days he didn’t open the window. Like dust and sleep and unfinished feelings. But it wasn’t hopeless. There was still breath here. Still time.