Page 109 of Vega

“I’m fine.”

“I didn’t ask if you were fine. I said get in. I’ll take you where you need to go.”

She looked down at her phone again, hesitated, but started to walk towards my ride. I reached over and pushed the door open. She climbed in slowly, bringing the smell of shea butter, clean laundry, and something sweet with her. She buckled her seat belt and held her phone as she tapped on it, canceling the ride.

“Where you going?” I asked.

Her voice got quieter. “To see Kash.”

The sadness in her eyes made my heart go out to her. I didn’t understand why I cared so much. Novi wasn’t my woman, my responsibility by blood, or somebody I had known long enough to justify the way my chest constricted whenever grief showed up on her face.

Still, I was glad I had been there.

I put the car in drive. “All right.”

She looked over. “You don’t have to take me.”

“I know.”

For a second, she almost smiled.

The cemetery wasn’t far. The ride stayed mostly quiet, but it wasn’t uncomfortable. It was the kind of silence that knew words wouldn’t fix anything. Novi stared out the window, thumb moving pointlessly over the edge of her phone case.

When we drove through the cemetery gates, she gave me directions to his grave.

“Left here.”

I turned.

“Keep going. He’s near that tree.”

I parked where she pointed.

For a moment, she didn’t move.

Then she opened the door and stepped out.

I got out too.

“You don’t have to come,” she said. “You don’t have to stay. I can take an Uber home.”

“I’ll wait.”

Her eyes lifted to mine. “Are you sure? I might be a while.”

“I got time.”

She nodded. Then she turned and walked toward the grave.

I got out but stayed near the car, leaning on the hood.

Kash’s headstone looked too new, and the grass around it was still too clean and undisturbed. Novi stopped in front of it and stood there with both arms wrapped around herself. She didn’t kneel right away. She just looked at his name like seeing it carved in stone still didn’t feel real.

Then her hand moved to her stomach. That one motion took the air out of my chest. She was standing beside Kash’s grave carrying his child. A whole future had been buried and created at the same time. She was mourning a man while preparing to love the part of him he left behind. That kind of pain felt too big for anybody to carry.

Watching her made me think about Arielle. The kind of love Novi still carried for Kash, even with him buried in the ground, was the kind of love Arielle had tried to give me while I still had the chance to hold on to it.

Arielle wanted a life with me, and I had been stupid enough to treat that like pressure instead of a blessing. Looking at Novi made me wonder if Arielle would’ve loved me that deeply if I had stopped acting like being loved was something to survive.