Chapter 30 New Year
MIA
The last night of the year was cold and clear in a way that made everything outside feel sharper than it needed to be. The kind of cold that turned headlights into long streaks and made every breath feel slightly more deliberate.
Chloe’s parents’ house was already warm when I arrived. Not just warm from heating, but from noise, movement, and people trying to convince themselves the year had been simpler than it actually was. A playlist filled the living room with songs that did not match each other, like memory instead of planning. In the kitchen, people leaned on counters, plates came and went, and sparkling grape juice filled champagne flutes because most of us were still underage and Chloe’s mother had decided celebration did not require alcohol, only permission.
I came because I had said I would come. That was the simplest version, but also the hardest. For most of the year, my life had narrowed into reaction. Court filings, hospital visits, ice schedules, messages that changed everything in a single sentence. Showing up somewhere just because I had agreed felt almost unfamiliar.
Chloe noticed when I arrived but did not come over immediately. She let me settle into the room first, like she understood that I needed a minute where nothing was being asked of me.
Caleb came because I asked him to.
He did not enter like he belonged at the center of anything. That was still something people misread about him. On the ice, he arrived before anyone noticed. Off it, he stayed slightly to the edge, watching before joining, listening before speaking. At first people read it as distance. Then they realized it was attention.
Chloe watched him for a while from across the kitchen, then pulled me into the hallway.
She closed the door halfway, muting the noise.
“He is not what I expected,” she said.
I leaned back against the wall. “I know.”
“I thought he would take up more space.”
“He used to,” I said. “In the way people expected him to. Now he does not perform it anymore.”
Chloe studied me. “That is what it is. He is not performing.”
“Yes.”
She glanced back toward the kitchen. “That is rare.”
“It is also harder.”
“Why harder?”
“Because people notice when someone stops pretending to be what they are supposed to be.”
She nodded slowly but did not answer.
When we went back inside, Caleb was sitting on the counter, listening more than talking. His attention moved through conversations like he was mapping them. He looked up when I entered, not to pull me in, just to register me.
Later, the night loosened. Time stopped being trackable. People moved between rooms, between voices, between versions of themselves that were slightly louder than usual. At some point I stopped following it and just existed inside it.
Eventually I stepped onto the back porch because the noise had become layered enough to blur everything together. The cold outside was immediate, but clean. No overlapping voices. No expectations.
I stayed longer than I meant to. The cold made thinking simpler.
The door opened behind me.
Caleb stepped out without his jacket.
“You are going to freeze,” I said without turning.
“I will survive,” he said.
He stood beside me. Close enough that the space between us stopped feeling like space.
Above us, the sky was completely clear. No clouds. No movement. Just stillness that made the end of the year feel like it had already happened and we were only catching up to it.
“What do you want from next year?” he asked.
I did not answer immediately. Not because I did not know, but because I had not been asked in a way that required honesty in a long time.
“I want my mom stable,” I said finally. “No complications with treatment. I want Jamie’s season to stay clean. No interruptions.”
He nodded without interrupting.
“I want the legal side of everything to stop expanding into everything else,” I added. “Not disappear. Just stop bleeding into every part of life.”
“And you?” he asked.
That one took longer.
“I want time that is not already spoken for,” I said. “A week where nothing is waiting to fall apart.”
He looked at me. “That exists.”
“Not often.”
“Rare is still real.”
We were quiet.
Inside the house, someone started counting down early, laughing at their mistake.
Then he said my name.
“Mia.”
“Yeah.”
“I need you to let me say something without turning it into something to fix,” he said.
I turned toward him fully. “Okay.”
He exhaled once, steadying himself.
“I love you,” he said.
It was not shaped for anyone else. No performance, no version adjusted for expectation. Just something direct enough that it did not need explanation.
“I do not mean what people assume,” he added. “I mean you. The way you show up in things. The way you carry everything like it is normal. The way you stay even when you should not have to.”
From inside, the countdown started.
Ten.
Nine.
Eight.
“I love you too,” I said.
“I do not love the version people expect either. I love the real one. The one who stops performing when no one is watching.”
Seven.
Six.
Five.
He stepped closer, just enough that the cold stopped feeling separate.
Four.
Three.
Two.
He kissed me as the year changed.
It was not dramatic. It did not need to be. It felt like something already decided, finally happening.
When he pulled back, his forehead rested briefly against mine. He was smiling in a way that was not controlled.
Inside, the house broke into noise. Cheers, shouting, movement all at once. Chloe knocked on the window and made a face that I knew I would hear about later.
We stayed outside a few seconds longer.
“Happy New Year,” he said.
“Happy New Year,” I said.
We went inside together.
The energy had shifted. People were louder, more open, like something had loosened in them at midnight. Chloe immediately spotted us and gave a look that said she had been waiting for this outcome.
My phone buzzed.
I almost ignored it.
Then I checked.
Griffith: Court confirmed. Injunction dismissed. No amendments remaining. We proceed Monday. You are clear.
I showed it to Caleb.
He read it once. “Good.”
Not celebration. Just fact.
We stayed a while longer until the night started to fade into fatigue. Eventually people left in groups, coats returning, goodbyes stretching longer than necessary.
When we left, the cold outside felt less sharp. Not softer, just real.
Caleb walked me to my building.
We stopped at the entrance. He looked at me like he was checking something he did not need words for.
“Same time tomorrow?” he said.
“Same time,” I said.
I went upstairs alone.
Inside, I checked on Mom out of habit. Her breathing was steady through the wall. Not perfect. Not fragile. Just consistent.
One.
Two.
Three.
I stayed there a moment longer than usual, listening.
Then I went to bed.
And for the first time in a long time, the year ahead did not feel like something chasing me.
It felt like something I was already standing inside of.