Chapter 79 Assurance
I get out of the car a second after he does. He’s already a few steps ahead of me when I catch up to him at the elevator. He presses the button. We stand side by side, not touching. The silence is different now. Not panicked or fragile, just heavy. The elevator arrives with a soft chime. We step inside. The mirrored walls reflect two men who look like they’ve aged in the span of an afternoon.
He keeps his eyes forward, I keep mine on the numbers climbing. When the doors open, he walks ahead again. Unlocks the apartment and steps inside. Ember is there immediately, weaving around his legs, meowing in soft accusation. He bends and scoops her up with a gentleness that makes something in my chest tighten.
“Hey,” he murmurs to her as he carries her into the kitchen while I linger near the doorway, unsure of my place in this new quiet. He sets her down briefly to grab a glass, fills it with water. Drinks half in slow pulls, like he’s trying to anchor himself back into his body. The kitchen light casts a pale glow over him.
He places the glass down carefully, then he walks toward the small table near the window. He likes that spot. I hadn’t consciously registered it before, but now I see the way he gravitates there. The chair angled just enough to catch the late light. The window close enough to feel connected to the world outside without being swallowed by it. Ember settles by his feet, grooming herself lazily, perfectly content. The domestic normalcy of it clashes with the tension threading through the room. I don’t know what this is between us right now.
It’s not anger.
It’s not distance.
It’s something denser and unfamiliar. Ryan finally turns to face me. He studies me so clinically it’s unnerving. After a long moment, he speaks.
“I don’t do well with dishonesty, Michael....Not even the gentle kind.”
His voice isn’t raised, it isn’t sharp. It’s simply steady.
“Don’t repackage the truth so I can digest it easier,” he adds quietly. “I’m already fighting my own body, I don’t want to fight for clarity too.”
The words land clean. His voice is low, but it cuts straight through the tension between us.
“Did you really resign?” he asks, and the question hangs in the air, trembling like a candle in the wind. I inhale slowly, feel the weight of it in my chest, and subtly shake my head. Not for hesitation, not for doubt. The movement is small, almost invisible, but it carries every choice, every consequence, every line I’ve crossed for him. His eyes narrow, searching mine. “So you abandoned the meeting because of me?” His words are careful, the kind that sound almost accusatory even when they’re just searching for truth.
I nod, letting the gesture settle between us. “Yes,” I admit quietly. “Because you matter more.”
I watch his face shift.....surprise, disbelief, the faint flash of frustration. He isn’t happy. I can feel it like a pulse between us. “I don’t regret it,” I continue. “I’d do it all over again. And if you’re blaming yourself, you shouldn’t. None of this is on you.”
He exhales sharply, trying to reason it out, to make sense of my actions. “How could I not?”
I shake my head again, gently, resolutely. “Because it’s true. You’re more important.”
I take a step closer, letting the silence stretch, letting him feel the weight of the choice I made for him. “What would you have wanted? That I stayed behind, worrying over a meeting I didn’t want to be in, losing myself in obligations that don’t matter despite knowing you possibly needed me?”
His chest rises and falls. His gaze falters. The air between us thickens with every unspoken word, every small confession, every pulse of truth. I step closer still. My pulse hammers....not from fear, but from the ache of knowing how small a world I inhabit when he’s not in it.
“If I’d gone,” I say, voice dropping lower, almost a whisper now, “I’d have been a ghost in the room, Ryan. Do you want me miserable?”
I can feel the tension coiling in him, the hesitation, the need to speak, to argue, to fix it. But I let him sit in it. I let him breathe it in.
“You’re more important,” I repeat softly, letting each word land, letting it press against his chest the way my hands want to press against him. “Every single time. And I mean it. You unfortunately don’t get a vote on that.”
He doesn’t look at me right away. He starts fiddling with his hands.... thumb dragging over knuckles, fingers lacing and unlacing like he’s trying to solve something tactile, something simple. It’s a nervous habit I’ve only seen a handful of times. When he’s thinking too much. When the thoughts are heavier than he wants to admit.
“I don’t want you to resent me.”
The words are quiet, but they hit harder than anything else he’s said. I close the distance between us, the remaining steps small but intentional, until I’m standing right beside him. Close enough to see the faint tremor in his lashes.
“Why on earth would you say that?” I ask softly.
My voice is confused, almost wounded. “What makes you think I’d resent you?”
He holds my gaze for a moment. Then something in it shifts. “Maybe right now everything you're doing feels noble.” A faint, humorless breath leaves him. “But six months from now? A year?” His eyes flicker, searching mine for fractures. “You might start to see the pattern. The opportunities you didn’t take. The things you let go of.”
His voice lowers. “And you’ll tell yourself you chose it. But somewhere under that, you might wonder what your life would’ve looked like if I wasn't sick...or if I wasn't in it.”
The room feels smaller.
“You might never say it out loud,” he continues. “You might never even mean to think it. But resentment doesn’t usually announce itself. It grows quietly.” His eyes soften into something raw. “And I don’t think I could survive being the reason you feel trapped.”
I take a moment before answering. Not because I don’t know what to say....I know exactly what I want to say, but because I need him to hear it the way it’s meant. Clearly. Without room for doubt or interpretation. So I step closer to the table.
“Ryan,” I say quietly.
He’s still looking down at his hands.
“I need you to look at me.”
There’s a small pause before he slowly lifts his head. Like the motion itself costs something. Our eyes meet and I hold his gaze so he can see there’s nowhere for this to hide.
“Listen to me,” I tell him, “And actually hear what I’m saying....this isn't something I'm just saying to make you feel better.” He watches me, wary. “The chances of me resenting you are about the same as me looking at you one day and feeling nothing.”
A quiet beat passes.
“I didn’t rush to you because I had to. I rushed to you because there isn’t a version of my life where I don’t. You’re not an obligation or a disruption. You’re not something that’s costing me my future.” I shake my head faintly. “If anything, you’re the only reason it still feels like one.”
I pull one of the other chairs closer until the legs scrape softly against the floor. Then I sit beside him, close enough that our shoulders touch. He doesn’t move at first. Carefully, I slide an arm around his shoulders and pull him toward me.
He comes without resistance. His body leans into mine slowly, like gravity has finally decided where he belongs. His head settles in the crook of my neck. I tighten my hold around him, one hand pressing gently into the back of his shoulder. “That’s the fear speaking,” I murmur quietly. “You shouldn’t let it win.”
He stays still against me. Listening.
“Because what I feel for you…” I pause, my fingers curl slightly against his shoulder.
“What I feel for you isn’t the sort of thing that turns into resentment, Ryan.” My arm tightens around him just a little more. “It’s the sort of thing that makes walking away from everything else feel like the easiest decision I’ve ever made.”