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“She’s not quite. You can come up if you want.” The disembodied voice sounded anything but keen.

“Thanks,” he responded, acknowledging he had a morbid curiosity to see where she lived.

Several heavy seconds later, the door buzzed open and he pushed it inwards, taking the steps two at a time until he reached the first floor, scanned the three numbered doors and knocked on hers.

He heard feet scuffling, muffled voices, and then the door was pulled inwards. And he felt like he’d been punched, all over again.

Because Chloe was there. Right there, in front of him, wearing stretchy black pants and a big sweater, with her hair pulled into a messy bun and her feet bare, her face natural, her cheeks pink and eyes glowing, and he felt like he’d caught her in the middle of some kind of game because she seemed…something. Something he liked, a lot. Something he couldn’t get enough of, and so he just stood there staring like a big, huge, silent tree.

“Dimitrios.” Gradually, the pink left her cheeks and the sparkle dimmed in her eyes. The fun seemed to be seeping out of her. “Come in.” She waved a hand towards a sofa, clearly visible from the front door, her apartment not only small, but modestly furnished.

He looked at her, as if searching for answers, but to a question he couldn’t formulate.

“Ellie, honey, how’s it going?”

He ignored the ache in his chest. Tried not to think about how heavy his arms suddenly felt with a need to reach out and hug her, to draw her close and apologise for all the stupid, shitty things he’d ever said. Even when he didn’t really know what they were. He just knew that she was no longer in his life and that was surely his fault.

He wanted her in his life. Needed her.

Ellie’s disembodied voice came back to them. “Two minutes! I’m nearly ready.”

Chloe glanced over her shoulder, then twisted her hands in front of herself. “Are you okay?”

It was the compassion he hadn’t expected. He dropped his head forward, staring at the floorboards, completely confounded. He didn’t know how to reply. No, he wasn’t okay. But showing weakness wasn’t for him. He’d been raised to always appear strong, even when he wasn’t.

“Yeah.”

“Okay, good. But she’s not. She’s feeling awful for having run away. I’ve told her you won’t be mad⁠—”

“I said the same thing.”

“I told her you love her. She doesn’t believe it.”

He cursed under his breath.

“I know that the general wisdom is that actions speak louder than words, and that’s true,” Chloe said earnestly. And perhaps she thought he wasn’t listening, because she reached out and squeezed his bicep. He suddenly wished he’d thought to remove his coat—her fingers were too far from his skin. “But you need to say it as well. You need to say it so often that your voice, your assurances, become the backing track to her life. You love her. You love her. You love her. Say it over and over again, like your life depends on it. Fill the huge gaps left in her world by being all that she needs. I know you can do it.”

The last sentence dug into a groove he hadn’t known he possessed, an aching wound that seemed to blister with fresh acid.

“How do you know?”

“I just do,” she said urgently. “And you have to know it, too. You love her. It’s that simple. Okay?”

She was so confident and assured that he could only nod, and a moment later, Ellie appeared, sheepishly, in the small living room.

“Hi.” Her voice was a tentative whisper; a question.

“Hey, kiddo.” He held out his hands, surprised that he no longer felt any fury or anger, or anything like it. Only love and gratitude. She ran into his arms and he wrapped them around her, holding her tight, kissing her head and breathing her in. “My God, I’m glad to see you.”

“I’m so sorry.”

“Don’t apologise,” he insisted. “You don’t need to. This was my mistake, and I’m going to fix it. Starting from now. Let’s get you home. I thought we could watch a Christmas movie together. This time, my choice.”

“Your choice?”

“Have you seen Die Hard?”

She wrinkled her nose. “Errm, doesn’t sound festive?”