Page 26 of Let Me In

I watch him. I don’t know what to say.

He looks down, then back at me. Takes a breath like he’s weighing something.

“You don’t have to,” he says.

A pause.

“But if you do call—”

His gaze catches mine, steady and sure.

“I’d answer. Every time.”

10

CAL

I watchher ride until I can’t.

Until the trees take her.

The last of the sun catches in her hair, a flicker of gold as she rounds the bend, and then she’s gone.

The air settles around me.

Quiet again.

But not the same.

I don’t go inside. Not right away.

I stand there for a long time. Mug still warm in my hand. The faint trace of her still in the air—clean cotton and a hint of warmth, like something soft lingering at the edge of thought.

My thumb runs slow over the curve of the ceramic. Not thinking. Just… grounding. The mug’s still half-full. She didn’t finish it. There’s something in the way that warmth lingers, like she left it on purpose. Like maybe some part of her wanted to stay, even if she couldn’t say it aloud. The half-left tea feels like a presence. Like a promise. Like hope I don’t quite dare name.

She packed up so carefully. Too carefully. Like she didn’t want to take up space, even after I told her she could stay. Like shestillthought she might’ve misread everything. And nexttime—I’m going to make sure there’s a next time—I want to be clearer. I want to say the words that don't leave her guessing.

But she didn’t.

God, she didn’t.

I’ve spent years building quiet. Protecting it. Earning it. Brick by brick, silence by silence. People don’t realize silence can be armor.

But she walked right into it. Not like a trespasser. Like she belonged.

Tea. Fudge. The smallest smile I’ve ever seen carry that much weight. She laughed like she didn’t know laughter had power. Like she didn’t know it was rare. And when she did, something inside me shifted—deep and low, like a quiet quake under still ground. It hit somewhere I thought was long gone. Stirred something I didn’t know I’d been missing.

And for the first time in a long time. I didn’t want to be alone with the quiet.

I wanted her in it.

She thinks I didn’t mean it. The number. The words.

But the truth is, I’ve never meant anything more.

She doesn’t even know how being near her quiets the noise I didn’t know was still there. How she centers me just by staying. How the smallest glimpse of her—on a bike, on a porch, with soft eyes and shaking fingers—feels like the whole world tipped just a little back into place.

Like something that had been wound too tight finally let go. And the steadier she makes me, the more I want to be that for her. To show up in the quiet, in the gaps where no one ever stayed long enough to matter. I want her to know that if she reaches again, I’ll be there. No hesitation, no flinch.

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