Page 2 of What Remains of Grace

“I’m so sorry,” her aunt whispered. “They tried, honey. Her heart just couldn’t take any more.”

Jenna’s knees gave out before her mind caught up. The clipboard clattered beside her.

“Not Grace,” she said, voice shaking. “She can’t be gone. They can’t both be gone. It can’t just be me.”

Her aunt’s voice faded, replaced by another one, the one she’d heard ten years ago, Grace’s voice.

Jenna heard the tears in Grace’s voice before she even spoke.

“Grace? Are you okay? What’s wrong?”

“Jenna . . . it’s Brooks.”

The memory slammed into her so fast she almost dropped the phone.

She pictured the rain-slick highway from the news photos, headlights bleeding too bright across the wet road, and Brooks’s truck bent wrong. It was the kind of image you wish you hadn’t clicked.

She remembered the sound of Grace’s sobs, the way she’d tried to stay calm for their parents, but her voice kept breaking. And later, their mother’s cry, low and animal and endless.

They said the road had been wet. They said the drunk driver had drifted over the line. They said a lot of things. None of it mattered.

The rain had dried, the wreck had been cleared, but it couldn’t be erased.

The image would remain forever: metal twisted, glass scattered like salt, and her brother’s smiling face frozen in a picture from the paper.

And now Grace.

For a second, it felt like Brooks had just died all over again, the old grief crashing back at the exact moment a new one split through her.

Her aunt’s voice came back through the line, unsteady. “Your parents. . . they’re not taking it well. They shouldn’t be driving. I’m at the hospital now—”

Jenna pressed her fist to her mouth, trying to breathe around the pressure in her chest, but not quite able to.

At some point, the call disconnected. She did not remember pressing the button.

Outside, she heard the first truck pull up, doors slamming, voices calling to each other. The workday was starting, whether she was ready for the world to turn again or not.

Grace’s name still echoed in her head, the same way Brooks’s had ten years ago. There was that same pause before the words, and the same hollow drop in her stomach when they were spoken.

Now it was her aunt saying her sister’s name, and everything inside her wanted to rewind, to unhear, to trade places with the Jenna from yesterday.

The house still smelled of paint and caffeine, as if the world hadn’t moved an inch. But it had.

Grace was gone. Brooks was already gone. Their parents, older now and worn by what they’d already survived, shouldn’t have to endure another funeral.

Jenna stared at the crooked cabinet on the wall and thought about how easy it was to fix wood when it split. You just filled the seam, clamped it tight, and waited for it to hold.

If only people worked that way.

Jenna didn’t remember standing up. One moment, she was on the floor; the next, she was at the kitchen counter with her laptop open among paint samples and a half-empty coffee cup, staring at the screen like it might tell her what to do next.

The noise outside grew louder, boots on pavement, men greeting each other as they came in. Someone said her name, asked a question, maybe two. She didn’t look up, and the words dissolved into noise.

She opened her calendar: meetings, bid reviews, and site visits. All suddenly felt meaningless. Her fingers began moving despite it all.

She called her assistant, forcing her voice into something steady that didn’t quite sound like her own.

“Hey, it’s me. Something happened. I’m . . . I’m going to need to step away for a few days.”