Page 19 of Deacon

A laugh escaped me, softer than usual but real, and some of the pressure inside my chest eased enough to let me breathe around it.

Jade’s expression shifted into quiet satisfaction. “There. That’s better.”

“What is?”

“You laughing.” She took another bite of egg. “It’s less creepy in here when you do that instead of staring into the void like a haunted woman in a lighthouse.”

I nearly inhaled my coffee. “A lighthouse?”

She shrugged. “I was going to say haunted Victorian widow, but the lighthouse felt more specific.”

“You need less internet.”

“You need more sleep.”

We ate in easy silence for a while.

Outside, the neighborhood had begun to wake. A car door slammed two houses down. Somewhere nearby, a dog barked. The ordinary sounds of morning carried on around us, steady and familiar.

I watched Jade over the rim of my mug while she frowned at her eggs as though they had personally offended her. The nightmare pressed back in before I could stop it: the trauma bay under those brutal lights, the flatline cutting across the monitor, my own voice breaking open as I begged Jackson not to leave before I could tell him.

I lowered my gaze before Jade caught whatever moved across my face.

“Mom.”

When I looked up, her fork had gone still halfway to her plate. She didn’t push or demand an explanation. She only watched me, waiting with that quiet patience that always made lying to her harder.

“You sure you’re okay?”

I held her gaze and gave her the closest version of the truth I could manage. “I’m tired. Last night was rough.”

Jade studied me for another moment before nodding. “Okay.”

It wasn’t belief. It was permission to keep the rest to myself a little longer, and she granted it even though we both knew the conversation wasn’t finished.

After breakfast, Jade collected the plates without being asked. I stood at the sink rinsing coffee from my mug while she talked around a bite of toast about Chloe’s latest disaster, a chemistry mnemonic she swore was genius, and whether Guncle Evan would be offended if she stole one of his better cardigan combinations for a Halloween costume.

Jade eventually headed down the hall to get dressed, leaving the house steadier behind her.

It wasn’t healed. It wasn’t safe from whatever came next.

But it was steady enough to stand inside.

I remained alone in the kitchen, both hands braced against the counter and closed my eyes.

The nightmare still clung to me, along with the image of Jackson unconscious in the ICU while the ventilator breathed for him and every word I had never said sat hard behind my teeth. At the same time, Sunday dinner at my father’s was waiting, Jade had a chemistry test and a paper on Of Mice and Men, and our breakfast dishes were cooling in the sink.

My life kept moving in all its ordinary directions while a man from my past lay unconscious ten minutes away, with no idea his daughter had just stood at my stove and made eggs.

My life had always been good at splitting itself into pieces and expecting me to carry them all.

I opened my eyes, rinsed my mug, and started getting ready for the day.

6

Lila

I stepped through the ER doors with my bag over one shoulder and coffee in hand, already feeling as though I had lived an entire day before clocking in. Blue looked up from the desk, and her expression changed the second she saw me.