Chapter 10: Fading

I leaned against the wall, trying to catch my breath, but it was useless. The air in the hallway felt too thin, my chest too tight. Every thought I’d been running from — every look, every touch, every unfinished moment with Kevin — kept replaying in my head like a cruel loop.

I pressed the back of my hand against my mouth, as if that could somehow silence the storm inside me. It didn’t. It only made the ache worse. I didn’t even know what I was doing anymore — pacing the hallway like some lost ghost while laughter and music still drifted faintly from downstairs.

I just needed to breathe. To feel something other than this painful pull toward someone I could never really have.

And then, I heard it.

“Abby?”

His voice. Low, familiar. Coming from behind me.

I froze for a second before I turned, my pulse quickening.

When I did, the sight of him almost knocked the air out of me.

Stephen.

Standing there in the dim light of the corridor — his hair damp, like he’d just showered, and his shirt nowhere in sight. His chest glistened faintly under the yellow light, a few droplets still clinging to his skin. His towel hung loosely around his neck, his expression caught somewhere between concern and curiosity.

I parted my lips before I could stop myself.

“Stephen…” It came out more like a breath than a word.

He frowned slightly, stepping closer, the muscles in his shoulders shifting as he moved. “Are you okay?”

I nodded too quickly, and the movement made my hair fall across my face. “Yeah, I—” My voice cracked. I swallowed hard and tried again. “I’m fine. I just… needed a minute.”

He studied me, eyes narrowing a little. “You don’t look fine.”

That word — fine — felt like an insult. Nothing about me was fine. I probably looked as wrecked as I felt, my lipstick smudged, the hem of my dress uneven, my heart still beating with the memory of Kevin’s hands.

Stephen tilted his head, taking a slow step closer. “Did something happen?”

The question hung in the air between us. And for a moment, I thought I might actually tell him. Everything. Just pour it all out and let him see how broken I was inside. But instead, I forced out a shaky laugh, hugging my arms around myself.

“No. Just… a lot of noise. I needed to breathe.”

He didn’t look convinced. His eyes softened — that same look he always gave me, the one that saw too much. The one that made me feel like I didn’t need to pretend.

“You’ve been distant lately,” he said quietly. “And sad. I can tell.”

His honesty hit me somewhere deep, in that place I tried not to look at. I shifted, suddenly aware of how close he was. The warmth radiating off him. The way his presence seemed to still the chaos for just a second.

I looked up, meeting his eyes, and for the first time in a long time, I didn’t see judgment there — just something raw and unguarded.

And maybe that was what scared me most.

Because standing there, in that dim hallway, staring at Stephen — the boy who’d always been good to me — I felt something unfamiliar. A flicker of guilt. And confusion. And the tiniest pull of something else I didn’t want to name.

“Stephen…” I whispered again, but my voice trailed off.

He stepped closer. Just a little. Just enough for me to feel the heat of his skin.

I swallowed hard, my throat dry. My thoughts scattered, tangled — Kevin’s name still echoing somewhere in my mind, but Stephen’s presence anchoring me in the moment.

And I hated that my heart didn’t know where to go.

Then, there was a moment — a brief, suspended second — where I almost opened my mouth to tell Stephen everything.

The truth sat like a stone in my throat, heavy and pulsing. But the idea of saying it aloud, of letting it spill into the air where it could never be taken back, terrified me. The words would destroy everything — my father, his marriage, whatever fragile life I was pretending to live. So, I swallowed it. Damned the thought of honesty. Buried it deeper.

I forced a shaky breath and looked anywhere but his eyes. And that’s when I saw it — his chest rising and falling slowly, his bare skin still dewy from the shower, the curve of muscle near his collarbone catching the hallway light. It was ridiculous — selfish, even — but staring at him helped me forget. Helped me push Kevin out of my head for just one trembling second.

But fate has a cruel sense of timing.

Because before I could blink, before I could pull myself together, he appeared.

Kevin.

He came out of nowhere — stepping into the hallway like some dark, inevitable gravity I couldn’t fight. He wasn’t supposed to be there, not now, not when my chest was already aching from everything that had happened between us.

The sight of him stopped me cold. His hair was still slightly tousled, his tux slightly undone at the collar, and his eyes… God, those eyes. They dragged over me with quiet fire, and I felt the heat pool low in my belly before I could stop it. My pulse quickened; my skin prickled like I’d been set alight. I could practically feel my heartbeat between my thighs.

He glanced at Stephen — that faint smirk playing on his lips like armor — and I knew instantly he was fighting the urge to drag me away from him. His eyes flicked between us, sharp and assessing, but he didn’t say a word about it.

“Hey,” he muttered, his tone too casual, too controlled. “Stephen.”

Then, just like that, he was gone — walking down the hall without looking back, leaving the air thick and charged behind him.

I stood frozen, my body betraying me. I couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe. My gaze followed him until he disappeared around the corner, my entire world moving with him.

And then, Stephen cleared his throat.

The sound snapped me back to reality. I blinked, realizing with horror that I had been staring — no, longing — openly, shamelessly, right in front of Stephen.

My cheeks flamed. I tried to cover the awkward silence with movement, smoothing my hair, tugging at the hem of my dress, pretending everything was normal. “I’ll, um—” My voice stumbled. “I’ll be at the ceremony hall.”

I turned quickly, hoping he wouldn’t see how shaken I was, how much my hands were trembling.

But before I could take more than a few steps, his voice followed me, steady and quiet — the kind of quiet that makes your stomach drop.

“Is something going on between you two?”

I froze mid-step.

For a second, I couldn’t even hear the music or the distant chatter from downstairs. Just the pounding of my heart — loud, accusing, desperate. I stared straight ahead, wishing I could vanish.

He’d seen too much. He wasn’t stupid. But that was when a part of me swore I'd bury the forbidden secret no matter what.

I turned slowly to face him, forcing every ounce of calm I didn’t have into my expression. “The only thing going on between Kevin and me,” I said carefully, “is the fact that he’s now abruptly my stepbrother, and we’re both trying to get used to… our parents’ decisions.”

The lie rolled off my tongue smoother than it should have, but it didn’t feel clean. It stuck to my teeth, bitter and heavy.

Stephen didn’t look convinced. Not even close. His eyes hardened just slightly — a flicker of something dark passing through them — disappointment, maybe. Or suspicion.

He studied me like I was a puzzle he’d almost solved but didn’t quite want to believe the answer to. And for a moment, I thought he might push further, demand the truth.

But I didn’t give him the chance.

I squared my shoulders, looked him straight in the eye, and turned away before he could say anything else. I didn’t care what he believed anymore. I couldn’t.

Because if I let myself care — if I let one more person close enough to see the cracks — I’d shatter completely.

And so, I walked away, leaving Stephen standing in the hallway, and left the truth rotting quietly inside me where it belonged. Even though it ate away at my soul.