If Evan ever comes back, don’t meet him because I asked you to. Meet him only if you truly want to face the part of my life I was never brave enough to share.

Later that evening, Owen texted me.

He wants to meet at sunrise if you do.

I sat on the porch until darkness settled around the house.

Callahan switched on my porch lamp.

“Do you want me here tomorrow morning?”

I looked down at Daniel’s watch.

The hands had stopped at 5:48.

The exact time the hospital first called me three years earlier.

“Not this time.”

Callahan nodded.

“Then go because you want to. Not because a dead man arranged good timing.”

I laughed.

Then I cried.

The next morning, I met Evan at a diner just outside town.

He was already sitting in a booth beside the window, both hands wrapped around a coffee cup he hadn’t touched.