The house is quiet, but his mind won’t shut off.
Everyone left hours ago. Final fittings, logistics, jokes, music, drinks. Smiles. So many damn smiles. Everyone excited for tomorrow — the wedding. His wedding.
To her.
He still can’t believe it.
She’s asleep upstairs. Or maybe just pretending, because she knows him well enough by now to know that silence this heavy always means he’s disappeared into his own head.
He steps out onto the balcony barefoot. The night air cuts through his hoodie, sharp and welcome. The sky is cloudless. Detroit is still and cold.
He sits on the edge of the outdoor couch, elbows on his knees, shoulders tight. The glass of water in his hand shakes slightly, but not from the cold.
He’s been here before — on the edge of something good — but never like this. Never with someone who sees through him and still stays.
She’s twenty-four years younger. Twenty-four years of difference.
She moves through life with ease — unbothered, glowing, full of fire and momentum. And him? He’s tired. Not of her — never of her — but of the weight he carries.
The past. The headlines. The scars.
What if the world’s right?
What if this is his version of a midlife crisis — and she’s just too kind to tell him so?
What if she wakes up in ten years — hell, five — and realizes she tied herself to someone who lives in silence more than light?
His chest tightens.
He thinks about the vows he wrote but hasn’t shown her. About how hard he had to fight just to believe he deserves someone who doesn’t run.
He thinks about his kids. Hailie’s cautious support. Alaina’s knowing look. Stevie’s quiet curiosity. All of them wondering, is this for real? Is she?
He exhales, long and low.
The door opens behind him. Light footsteps. Her.