Page 6 of Good Graces

The first sip burns in the best way. I brace my hands against the counter, exhaling slowly.

I sense him before I see him.

Something shifts behind me. A presence I’d know anywhere. The sound of footsteps—steady, familiar, and frustratingly calm.

Warren doesn’t say anything right away. He moves to the sink, fills a cup of his own, takes a slow drink like we’re not standing three feet apart for the first time in two and a half years.

I stare ahead, eyes fixed on the ice melting in my glass, counting each drop like it might keep me steady. My jaw tightens. My shoulders stay stiff.

The silence stretches too long, and eventually, his voice cuts through it. Low, flat. “Didn’t think you’d be here this summer.”

I don’t turn my head to face him. I can’t. “Didn’t think you cared.”

A beat of silence, then, “I don’t.”

Without another word, he turns and walks away. Like I mean nothing. Like I never did.

I stand there, jaw clenched, gripping my cup so hard it crinkles in my hand. A sharp pulse of anger, regret, and something dangerously close to heartbreak lodges itself in my throat. It’s all I can do to swallow it down. Bury it deep. Keep on moving.

But I know better. I know him. And if Warren really didn’t care, he wouldn’t have said anything at all.

3

WARREN

The waterin the training pool is cold, clean, perfect.

I push through my stroke, arms cutting through the lane, each kick driving me forward. I’m fast, efficient, controlled. My breath is steady, my muscles tight but strong, each motion a carefully measured calculation of power and endurance.

I crave this. Savor it. The drag of water against my skin, the rhythmic churn of my body gliding forward, the momentary burn of oxygen deprivation before I roll for another breath.

It’s 5:04 a.m., and I’m already ten laps in.

I didn’t set an alarm. Didn’t need to. My body just knew. Years of training have made this muscle memory, instinct. I could do it in my sleep, could time my strokes without thinking, could pull myself through lap after lap while my brain stays blissfully blank.

No distractions, no noise, no unwanted thoughts slipping through the cracks.

Fifty meters. Flip turn. Fifty meters back.

The water dulls everything. Mutes the world, quiets my mind, forces me to focus on the mechanics. The rotation of my shoulders, the angle of my entry, the precision of my kick. This is what I know, what I trust. The one thing in my life that’s never let me down, never betrayed me, never left me standing in the wreckage of something I couldn’t put back together.

Five strokes, breathe. Five strokes, breathe.

I kick harder, propelling forward, lungs burning but steady, muscles tight but capable. I go until the strain in my limbs is the only thing I can feel, until my heartbeat drowns out the whisper of anything else trying to break through.

Because as long as I’m swimming, I’m not thinking.

I don’t stop until my arms are screaming and my pulse hammers in my throat. Until my body demands air in a way that makes it impossible to ignore. I grip the wall, fingers digging into the slick tile, drag in a lungful of breath, feel the tension in my chest ease just enough.

And just like that, she’s there.

Not physically. Not in any real, tangible way. But in my fucking head, where I don’t want her, where I refuse to let her take up space.

It’s quick. Just a flicker, a whisper, a flash of something unwelcome and unrelenting. Soft fingers pressing against my chest, dragging down the center of my sternum, her touch light but certain. The heat of her, flush against me, breath warm as she whispered my name like it was something to be savored.

“Warren, please, baby . . .”

I slam it down. Shut it off.

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