***Trigger Warning: This chapter contains themes of grief and self-destructive behavior.
Time will heal, they tell you.
On its schedule, when it feels like it, if it actually gives a shit about you, is what I say to that.
Because time, in the last two weeks, hasn't moved for me, even as the world carried on.
I went through the motions like a puppet on strings, unable to process the why and how and what next.
From the moment I stopped hearing Cece's faint breaths, to the mad scramble when police and emergency responders arrived, to the wait in the hospital hallway for confirmation of what I already knew—it was like I'd already stepped out of my body and sat in a corner watching the whole thing unfold.
Cece was gone.
Recklessly beautiful and daring one moment, and cold and lifeless the next.
Clint, still unfortunately alive and claiming to be horrified by what he'd done, had started negotiating a plea deal. I didn't give a fuck. I was long gone past anger and nothing I did to him was going to bring her back.
Carmela and I lived like ghosts in Cece's house—silent along the halls, weeping throughout the night, haunting the place more relentlessly than the dead.
We held a small funeral yesterday, open to anyone who wanted to come.
While I hated it, Cece had craved attention her whole life.
She would be offended if I took away her last opportunity at it.
So I stood there and ignored the cameras and mics that were pointed my way like they were expecting some kind of unraveling. For me to do what I was notorious for doing—lashing out.
But I was at a point where I felt nothing.
I wasn't sad or cold or hurting.
I was just... empty.
I had no tears or words—not even for Sidney and Jamie who came to be there for me.
Only the faintest shadow of an emotion stirred when I saw Stellan standing with Max at the back row, both in black suits, faces somber.
When the small crowd thinned, they approached. Without a word, Max wrapped me up in a big warm hug that did nothing for the void inside of me.
"I'm so sorry, Kady," he murmured in a low tone before pulling away to look at my face. "If you need anything—and I mean anything—you let me know."
I managed a flat thank-you before automatically turning to Stellan.
I met his eyes, ready with the same default response I used with every conversation I'd endured that morning.
But he said nothing.
Just looked at me with those deep, dark brown eyes that haven't smiled in a while.
And with everything that's happened, that was the first thing I registered to be wrong in the most basic level.
And it was the first thing I felt like I should do something about.
And that made me feel my first pang of guilt—and threatened me with the all-consuming wave that was going to swallow me whole soon enough, once the numbness has faded.
"Thanks for coming," was all I managed to say before I averted my eyes and edged away.
He didn't stop me and I didn't look back.
And now it was New Year's Eve.
I could already hear some fireworks going off outside but the house remained dark as it had throughout the holidays.
Carmela came to see me hours ago, asked if I wanted dinner like she has every day in the last two weeks. And I gave the same mere shrug and she repeated her line, "Your mother would've wanted you to take care of yourself."
And she left it at that and left me alone.
We both knew there were many things my mother could've told me. Like the fact that she'd saved all the money I'd ever sent her and left it in a trust for me. Never spent a penny of it.
And that she'd willed the house back to me.
And that she'd kept boxes and boxes full of mementos from my years growing up.
She could've told me she loved me at least once.
For most of my life, I thought I was merely an accessory a spoiled starlet like Cece had acquired for the sake of acquiring it, not realizing a child required more care than a dog. Oh, she would constantly tell me how much she adored me, how I was her favorite person, how I was such a darling daughter, but she never once used the word love—not until she was seconds from dying.
I wish she'd let me get to know her better. That she'd let me in. That she'd been able to teach me how to do it myself.
I wish she'd hadn't held me at arm's length my whole life, afraid to love me, even if in the end, she did anyway. She could've let me love her back and maybe both our lives would've been fuller. And maybe life wouldn't have ended for her the way it had.
I noticed the faint swing of the bedroom door opening. Didn't even look up from Cece's bed where I'd curled up, my arms wrapped around one of her satin-covered pillows that still faintly smelled like her.
Then suddenly, the bed dipped with the weight of a large, warm body sliding down behind me, an arm coming around to wrap me in a hug.
My eyes squeezed shut, my breath thinning.
Stellan.
He didn't say anything. Just held me. And I let him.
I wanted to cry and clutch at him and beg him to hold me forever but my tears couldn't escape and my words couldn't form.
"Let me take you home, Kady," Stellan finally murmured, his lips pressing a kiss against the top of my head. "And let me stay with you for as long as you need me to."
I couldn't speak.
All I could do was tremble and put my hand over his own that rested against my stomach.
He buried his face against my hair, his body shuddering with some effort as he pulled me closer against him, his arm tightening around me.
"I can never take away this pain from you—not until it's had its due," he said, a catch in his voice. "But I can be there for you each day, to try and make you smile. To hold your hand and remind you that you're not alone. To love you until someday it can be enough."
He could.
I could let him.
But I don't know when that someday would be.
I don't know when I would be whole enough again.
And I don't know what it would do to Stellan, to love a shell of a human who couldn't even feel the raw pain she deserved at the moment.
He cupped my face and gently turned me to towards him, waiting patiently until I met his eyes.
Those deep brown eyes warmed the cold in my soul, wrapping me in so much comfort and safety.
His smile was faint—just a little curved crook on the corner—as he tenderly brushed the back of his fingers along my cheek.
"I don't even need you to love me back," he said although the glint of emotion in his eyes told me what it cost him to say that. "I'm certain I've got enough for the both of us."
What was left of my heart broke.
Because for Stellan to forgo being loved back was a tragedy of its own.
And I was done with tragedies.
I know I'm standing precariously on a razor's edge.
And I either have to come away from it or have Stellan willingly follow me down on the fall.
And as always, when it came to Stellan, I chose unselfishly.
He deserves no less.
And I deserve no better.
******
Six months later...
Darby, Montana
"For fuck's sake, Kady. Get a grip."
I opened one bleary eye and saw Jamie in my kitchen. Or what's left of it after the demo two days ago. Or maybe it had been three days ago. Four?
"You're here. But I haven't picked you up yet," I said stupidly as I pushed myself to sit up on the bed.
I glanced down. It wasn't actually the bed. I was on top of a pile of clothes in the corner of the living room.
"Yes, well. I got tired of waiting an hour at the airport for you to pick me up," he said.
When he was chatty like this, that means I fucked up. Fucked up really badly and that took a lot by Jamie's standards.
He didn't once look at me as he started pacing, checking things, picking up stuff. He was going around so fast, he was making my aching head hurt worse.
"What are you doing?" I asked him, sitting back down when my attempt at getting up on my feet made me woozy.
"Cleaning up after you like I have in the past six months," he said.
As my gaze cleared, I took a good look around the cabin where I'd been holed up in the past half a year. I took off on a very long road trip one day, leaving a note for Carmela and a voicemail to both Jamie and Sidney to say that I was going to fix up a cabin I'd bought in a small Montana town.
I didn't tell Stellan anything.
I couldn't.
Not after I sent him home that New Year's Eve with a deadened "I can't do this" response and no other explanation.
So here I was, with a cabin about to fall over my head, hungover. Edgy.
"The contractors will be here on the weekend," I told Jamie, stretching my legs out and knocking over an empty bottle of whiskey with my toes.
I tried to push it off to the side and under a discarded sweater but Jamie already saw it.
He glared at me and swiped it off the floor. Then he swept the pile of sweaters aside and found several more empty bottles.
I grimaced and hung my head low, not wanting to look into his eyes.
"You're a wreck," he bit out before starting to collect the bottles.
"Thanks, captain obvious," I muttered, pressing my fingers against my pounding head. "You could've just sent me a note."
"Can't. Not anymore," he said. "The contractors called several times last week. Two have already quit and a couple more are threatening to. Some days they show up and you yell at them to go away. Some days, you're passed out drunk. Last week, you picked a fight with the foreman."
I looked up and scowled at him. "He was saying nasty things to me."
Jamie's expression didn't change. "Yes, he was. After you threw up all over the newly laid down subfloor because you wouldn't go away even when you were wasted. At nine in the morning."
I shrugged. "Time's slower in the country."
"You need help."
"I just need everyone to leave me alone," I snapped. "Why d'you think I hauled my ass all the way over here?"
Jamie didn't say anything for a long stretch that eventually, I had to look at him again.
Surprisingly, he didn't look mad.
"You're letting everyone down, Kady," he said quietly.
I gasped out loud as if I'd been physically kicked in the chest, my jaw dropping. "Wow! Let's not spare my feelings, yeah? Just put it out there how much of a fucking letdown I—"
"You don't want anyone to feel sorry for you," Jamie said, undeterred. "You don't want help. You lash back if anyone gets mad at you. So all that's left to do is just tell you what's what."
"And what's that exactly?" I yelled, angry now but worse, so fucking ripped open that I had to rub my chest as if the pain was physical.
Jamie didn't even blink as he fired at me. "You abandoned Carmela. You skipped out on Sidney. You left all your modeling gigs up in the air with no notice. You sent away probably the only man who can ever understand you. You left me and the crew to weed through both the construction and the finances of all our ongoing projects. We have a site that's about to get shut down and I might have to let a couple of the guys go if we get slapped a stop-work order. You've dragged out this cabin renovation and you're about to lose your crew here."
I blinked, trying to process all that he'd flung my way, my throat growing tight.
Swallowing hard, I wound my fingers tightly until they hurt.
I'm so numb these days, feeling anything takes me by surprise.
"I was just... I just wanted to get away."
"Is that all?" Jamie demanded. "Carmela said you hounded Cece's old doctor to renew her prescription. That's not getting away, Kady."
I narrowed my eyes at him. "They help, okay? Passing time is easier."
"You passing time till you're just gone, is that it?" he said with a shake of his head. "Here one day and gone the next. What a waste."
"It's my life and I'll do whatever the fuck I want to do with it!" I shouted at him, kicking a bottle towards him that he had to jump out of the way to avoid it.
"I get it!" Jamie shouted back at me for the first time ever in our entire history. "You want to just get drunk and numb and fade out of existence. You're blaming yourself for something you can't do anything about anymore. Well, I just gave you a list of things you still have control over. Maybe do something about them. Maybe that will make you feel better. Cece's dead. But we're still all here."
I wanted to lunge at Jamie and hit him for his crudeness.
For his nerve.
Because he didn't understand the pain.
Or the guilt.
Or the regret.
Then something cracked in his expression.
His gaze softened, his lips pressed into a thin line.
"At least that's what I told my Mama after my Pa got shot down on the street," he said in a bleak tone. "But me and my little brother couldn't keep her from following the dead."
Jamie picked up one last empty liquor bottle and walked out.
I pressed a dirty hand against my mouth to hold back the sobs.
To hold back the pain and the guilt and stitch the rip close until it could scab over again.
But it was too damn late.
*****
Ninya's Notes
I know this is short but I just needed to write this part of Kady's story exactly as it needed to be told. No embellishments or elaboration on her pain. It's her lowest point and I think we don't have to over-define the rock bottom she's finally found.
Throughout the writing of the really heavy, painful, destructive parts of this story, this song has been the soundtrack. I can actually picture out Kady's whole journey from this one song alone. It'll take a very brave, loyal kind of man to keep loving her through all the shit she's going through.
I hope you never find yourself or someone you love in this kind of situation.
I have slowly carved Kady's path down to it, showing a little bit chapter by chapter how it doesn't take very much over time to get to a very bad place. She's often dealt with her issues through drinking and denial and the loss of both Cece and Stellan, although in different ways, have just simply pushed her over the edge now.
She's going to need time and help—lots of both—to come out of this. And as much as my heart hurt for Stellan as well in this chapter, being the person whose perspective probably relates to the song best, I think Kady did the right thing here for the both of them. Stellan will follow her down all her darkest roads and she doesn't want that. Even through her pain, the instinct to protect him pierces through. Crazy, eh? How they both want to protect each other and that sometimes means walking away.
And Jamie, though, with that devastating line... a man of few words but always with ones that matter.
Anyway, the line that hits me the hardest in this song is probably the quietest one in it—The warning signs can feel like they're butterflies. I hope we always notice them before it's too late.
Alright.... Let that sink in for a bit and let's take a deep breath and try to move forward with her next week.
♪♪♪ Chapter Soundtrack: Graveyard by Halsey ♪♪♪
It's crazy when
The thing you love the most is the detriment
Let that sink in
You can think again
When the hand you wanna hold is a weapon and
You're nothin' but skin
Oh, 'cause I keep diggin' myself down deeper
I won't stop 'til I get where you are
I keep running, I keep running, I keep running
They say I may be making a mistake
I woulda followed all the way, no matter how far
I know when you go down all your darkest roads
I woulda followed all the way to the graveyard
Oh, 'cause I keep diggin' myself down deeper
I won't stop 'til I get where you are
I keep running when both my feet hurt
I won't stop 'til I get where you are
Oh, when you go down all your darkest roads
I would have followed all the way to the graveyard (No, oh)
You look at me (Look at me)
With eyes so dark, don't know how you even see
You push right through me (Push right through me)
It's gettin' real
You lock the door, you're drunk at the steering wheel
And I can't conceal
Oh, 'cause I've been diggin' myself down deeper
I won't stop 'til I get where you are
I keep running, I keep running, I keep running
They say I may be making a mistake
I would have followed all the way, no matter how far
I know when you go down all your darkest roads
I would have followed all the way to the graveyard
Oh, 'cause I keep diggin' myself down deeper
I won't stop 'til I get where you are
I keep running when both my feet hurt
I won't stop 'til I get where you are
Oh, when you go down all your darkest roads
I would have followed all the way to the graveyard
Oh, it's funny how
The warning signs can feel like they're butterflies