SEPTEMBER 17th, 2001, LOS ANGELES, CA

IT WAS A strange thing to feel united with the whole country in a shared sense of sadness. There had been disasters before, many that Reagan could remember prominently, but nothing had quite stunned the population of America into such aching loss as what had happened less than a week prior.

She couldn't get the images from the television out of her head. Planes crashing into the World Trade Center, eviscerating the buildings and people still trapped inside of them within the span of two hours.

The mere fact that it had played out before her eyes had been a lot to process, but the tragedy was even harder to make sense of when Reagan was already struggling. She'd felt nothing but shock at first as she'd stood amongst her coworkers in the Geffen office, watching as terror unfolded in New York City.

She felt selfish, sitting around viewing the terrorist attacks through a lens that suggested she was taking a personal slight. If anything, she just couldn't understand that it'd happened. Like many other people, she was shouldering her own tragedies and now a new one, a mutually shared one across every state line, had occurred.

Reagan sat one of the barstools she'd recently added to the kitchen countertops, rocking gently with her hands clasped to her shoulders. The house was dead quiet. In the days after 9/11, she'd stayed glued to the television, devouring every available piece of news coverage like the rest of the world, but it had gotten to be too much. She'd eventually shut off the t.v. and kept it that way, unable to stomach the constant replays of destruction and death.

As she drew the tip of her pointer finger along the counter, creating invisible swirling circles, she thought of her family. She missed them and yearned for their company as badly as ever in the midst of all the tragedy, but of course Kimberly had shrieked at her not to get on a plane. Not any time soon, at least.

It probably wouldn't have helped, being in her childhood home anyway. She would have had the company she was craving, but it would have been off kilter, overpowered the permeant sadness that had consumed the Abner household. The whole summer had been hell in itself, jetting back and forth between Los Angeles and Olympia and looking into Richard's eyes, reading past the attempt of a smile that he offered her. It was hard, even though necessary, to be around her dad when time was fading fast. It was even harder to watch him change in small progressions, forgetting simple things like the names of places from their best memories or the melodies of songs they'd sung together on card rides.

Dropping her cheek into her hand, Reagan flipped over her cellphone. No new messages. The last time she'd received a call, it had been from Jesse.

He'd been in New York on the eleventh — a routine visit back to home. She'd frantically gotten a hold of him the day of the attacks and of course, he'd been distraught, but he was safely out of the city now. Scarred beyond belief, but safe at least. She wondered how fucked up he'd be the next time she saw him, though it killed her to imagine it. Even on the phone she'd been able to tell that Jesse's effervescent happiness had been extinguished by what he'd seen happen to his beloved New York. She wished she could have said something — anything to comfort him, but it was simply too big of a shock for her to coax him out of on her own.

It was even harder trying to balance her worry for Jesse with the mingling thoughts of Dave that had been stewing in the back of her mind since August. The attack on New York had only amplified them, serving as half the reason as to why Reagan's heart hadn't stopped racing.

She missed him. She missed him horribly. Between the personal tragedy of nearly losing Taylor and now the one that had engulfed the world, there was only one person whose company Reagan truly felt she needed most and it was Dave's.

It'd been a steady buildup over the last few weeks. She'd spent her nights staring up at the darkened ceiling of her room, her fingers clutching along the sheets that he'd once slept in. It hadn't worked, trying to close her eyes and get some sleep, because Dave would appear in her dreams. He'd been there like a ghost, haunting her for the literal twenty-four hours of every passing day.

Reagan's legs bounced anxiously and somewhere in her psyche, her ego scoffed. There was nothing outwardly silly about the fact that she'd finally realized what she'd denied to be true for so long — she loved Dave, more than she'd love anyone else besides their daughter. When she tried to picture the next thirty or forty years of her life, she could only see him beside her, gray-haired and wrinkled.

The only silly thing about it was that she struggled with how exactly to tell him about her revelation. Even she knew that it came across as exhausting, her never-ending oscillation between commitment versus trying to forget.

But Reagan was finished with trying to forget. The limit of trying had been reached, sparked to life as she'd watched the Twin Towers crumble one after the other on her television screen. The truth had manifested after a summer's worth of struggling to accept that her father was soon never going to be the same. Corny as it was, she found herself with a new appreciation for how fleeting life was, and she didn't want hers to go by without the person she loved.

Mentally acknowledging it made her swallow, fighting the dryness in her throat. She was ready to tell him, ready to lay it all out on the table so that they could be together again, but the idea was still harrowing. It was something she hadn't said aloud yet.

Dave had barely spoken to Reagan since Taylor and London and the inexplicable sadness that he'd been plunged into. If not for Gracie, she wondered if he would have even spoken to her at all. They'd communicated mostly through text messages and the occasional polite phone call, coordinating when and where Gracie would be exchanged between them. Occasionally he had not even gotten out of his car to retrieve her. Reagan had been left to watch him morosely from the front porch as Gracie had slipped down the driveway, duffle bag thrown over her shoulder.

She told herself that it was only fair for Dave to angle that kind of bitterly cold shoulder towards her. It wasn't intentionally cold, she presumed — he was trying, just like her, to move on. The way he must have seen it, at least to Reagan, was that there was no use in being forced to look into her eyes more than necessary, or divulge his truest feelings to her over the phone.

He was being oddly placid, but she could accept that. It was easy to accept when she knew that only she had the power to change it. Telling him how she felt, that she wanted him back permanently, would make them both happy. She'd finally be able to act on the sparks she'd been feeling, reminiscent of when they'd first met.

Reagan's phone began chiming beneath the cover of her hand. She saw the number flashing on the outside screen and inhaled a sharp breath of both relief and pleasure.

"Ginny," she blurted immediately after raising the phone to her ear.

"Hi, honey."

The warm, maternal sound of Ginny's voice soothed Reagan into a calm that was desperately needed. Since she didn't trust her own mother enough to talk her down from the height that her thoughts had skyrocketed her into, Dave's mom was an excellent replacement.

"Everything okay over there?" Reagan asked, running her fingers back through her hair.

"As okay as they can be right now," Ginny answered with a hint of graveness.

It'd been Dave who had shuttled his mother quickly across the country in a tour bus after the eleventh. The proximity of the separate attack on the Pentagon to Ginny had left him uneasy, and he'd sent for her as soon as it'd happened. When Ginny had arrived, Reagan had released Gracie into her care, figuring that she and Ginny both needed the quality time. As badly as Reagan had wanted to hold her daughter in the midst of a national crisis, she'd known that there was no better distraction for Gracie than the loving grandmother that she didn't get to see nearly enough.

"Yeah. Things have been . . . sad." Reagan didn't know how else to describe the fog of gnawing pain that had settled over everyone. The words 'devastating' and 'shocking' had already been used plenty by every news outlet across the country.

"You shouldn't be alone right now," Ginny chided. "I called to see if I could bring Gracie back to you. We could spend time together, the three of us."

The opportunity to spend time with Ginny was in itself a treat, but it wasn't the precise reason behind the sudden stop of Reagan's heart. It must have held off for a whole beat before thudding again, heavier than before, pounding all the way to her ears.

An idea had snuck up on her, one that made perfect sense once the pieces clicked into place. It was less of a plan and more of a tentative attempt to reel in her emotions, but there was no better outlet than Ginny to channel them through.

If she was going to confess her ultimately undying love for a man, it couldn't hurt to at least start with confiding in his mother, mainly when his mother had become the parent Reagan had always been missing.

"Sure," she said, hoping her voice didn't betray a tremble. "You can bring her back now. Stay a little."

Ginny cheerfully agreed. After she hung up, a high tide of anxiety flooded Reagan again, but it was more comparable to stage fright than the stinging burn that had bothered her before.

As she raced around the house straightening throw pillows and picking up evidence of Gracie's discarded messes, she rehearsed what she planned to say.

Ginny . . . I'm in love with your son.

No, she thought dismissively as she picked up a pair of Gracie's shoes from the living room floor. Too cheesy — she wasn't a sixteen year old in high school, after all.

Ginny, I want Dave back and I want him to want me back, too.

Too vague. Maybe too desperate, as well. She was aiming for a clear and concise explanation, not a hopeless blubbering confession.

It felt important that she get it right, not only because it was Ginny of all people that she was telling, but because she hadn't told anyone else yet. Not Kate, not Chris, and especially not Jesse. He was her friend, but she didn't think he'd want to hear her declare that she was still in love with her ex.

Reagan had wanted to tell. She'd wanted to confide in someone, hoping that it would relieve some of her burden, but she couldn't deny how annoyingly fickle she seemed from an outsider's perspective. She hadn't surmised a firm way to tell the people she was closest to that she was dead serious this time. She wanted Dave back, and not just for a night, but for forever. Thinking about what they might have said in return had made her cringe.

It was important that  she was careful in how she proceeded with her feelings. She considered Gracie, who didn't need to be ensnared once again in the wishy-washy web of her parents' relationship. Of course, Reagan believed that this time around would be different, but she treaded delicately anyway. When the time was right, Gracie would be able to celebrate the reunion of her parents without the fear that it wouldn't last. Regan refused to do that to her again.

Standing in front of her bathroom mirror, Reagan inspected her face and tried to decide whether she looked haggard. She wondered if it would be obvious to Ginny that she was an emotional wreck, and not just because of what had happened on the eleventh. Tilting her chin down and examining her eyes, trying to measure how red-rimmed they actually were, she imagined Ginny being able to discern straightaway that she was in a bad way.

She didn't have time to ponder it for much longer. The doorbell rang, making Reagan flinch. Walking out of the bathroom, she glanced at the alarm clock on her nightstand and realized that nearly thirty minutes had flown by since her and Ginny's phone call.

She took a deep breath, rolling her shoulders back and reminding herself that there was no reason to be unhappy or afraid.

It was a good thing. All of it. She'd come to her senses and soon enough, things would be normal again, the way they'd been before the concept of 'divorce' had even flitted across her radar. She wouldn't have to dream about Dave anymore because he'd be there, goofing off with his stunted sense of humor and playing guitar in the next room over and laying against her at night, one arm tucked tight around her waist with his hair on her pillow.

The proper order of getting there was to open up to someone she trusted, a person who knew Dave as well as she did. Someone who would be happy for them both without question.

Putting on an authentic smile that slid easily onto her face, Reagan opened her front door with a poignant renewed sense of hope.

"Mom!"

Gracie threw her arms around Reagan's midsection and gave her a tight squeeze, burying her face into the front of Reagan's shirt. The effect of the terrorist attacks hadn't been limited to just adults. Gracie had been a little more vulnerable since they'd happened, understandably scared by what she'd seen and heard.

"Hey G," Reagan said, smoothing a hand over Gracie's head. She looked up and found Ginny beaming at her, a picture of true happiness in spite of all the tragedy.

"Ginny." Reagan's voice brimmed with emotion as she maneuvered around Gracie to give her ex mother-in-law a hug, taking in the light scent of her familiar perfume and relishing the feeling of her embrace. It was the first time Reagan was seeing Ginny since she'd arrived in Los Angeles. Dave had been the one to collect Gracie from school on the fourteenth.

"Are you alright?" Ginny asked, drawing back and laying a hand against Reagan's cheek.

'Alright' was a loaded word, at least considering what she was actually feeling. It was far from accurate, but in some ways it did apply. She was still breathing — that was something.

Shifting her weight between both feet, Reagan awkwardly stepped aside and tried to keep the wobbly smile on her face pronounced.

"I think you should come in," she said.

Gracie darted past them and flew down the nearest hallway, disappearing into a room. Ginny let out a light laugh, signaling that she knew exactly what her granddaughter was up to.

"She's been telling me nonstop about her bass playing," she explained to Reagan through a chuckle. "Been putting on shows for me, too, but she insisted that the bass she keeps here is her favorite to play."

"Really? Out of the dozen Dave must keep aside for her?"

Reagan held her breath as the words left her mouth, hoping they didn't sound snarky. She was trying to tread as lightly as possible, navigating an awkward maze of timidness.

"I think it's fair to say she has a favorite," Ginny smiled.

As they walked into the living room, Reagan veered towards the kitchen and spoke over her shoulder to Ginny, intent on grabbing them both a drink. Predictably, Ginny followed her, never one to be doted upon when she herself was known to do the doting.

"How's it been so far? Your stay?" Reagan asked as she opened the fridge and tucked her hair back from her face, scanning the shelves for a selection to serve.

"It's been surprisingly nice. We've managed to distract to each other from everything going on."

Wetting her lips with the tip of her tongue, Reagan wondered fleetingly who "we" was. Ginny, Gracie and Dave? Or were other people implied in the statement? Maybe there had been a get together, one that she had not been invited to for obvious reasons.

"That's good. Good for Gracie. I knew being with you during all of this would lift her spirits a bit."

Reagan grabbed the boxed container of lemonade that Gracie always insisted she buy from the grocery store, a special brand to accommodate her preferences, but when she turned to Ginny she saw her eyeing the bottle of red wine that had been left out on the counter. Ginny nodded at it.

"Maybe we finish where you left off?" she teased with a warm smile.

Reagan felt her face flush and she cursed herself for having stashed her wine glass yet forgotten to put the bottle away. It may as well have looked like she was swigging straight from it. Not that the idea hadn't crossed her mind and not that it hadn't happened before.

"That's embarrassing," she muttered as her cheeks flamed pink.

"Not at all. I think it's just what we need. Where do you keep your glasses?"

"In the cabinet, above the wine cooler."

Ginny retrieved two wine glasses and set them down on the counter, allowing Reagan to pour. From the living room, they heard the low thrum of a bass being played, hooked up to its amplifier.

"I hope you're a ready for an impromptu concert," Reagan said. "She can go for up to at least two hours."

Ginny laughed. "Just like her father."

Reagan felt her chest tighten. Ginny had certainly hit the mark with that assertion.

They joined Gracie in the living room, tucking themselves onto the couch as she played for them cross-legged on the living room floor. As Reagan watched, listening to Ginny's praise of Gracie's bass solo, she thought of Dave.

Of course she did. His permanent place of residence had become her mind and it didn't help that Ginny had reminded her of how just alike he and Gracie were. DNA had truly worked its magic.

An hour in to Gracie's performance, Reagan began to realize that Ginny's sidelong glances at her were becoming more frequent. It made her nervous, questioning what her face might have looked like as she sat there nursing her wine. She hoped that she didn't look as hollow as she felt, especially when they were sharing a moment to appreciate Gracie's shine. She'd drained the contents of her glass by the time Ginny patted her leg and set her own glass down.

"That was wonderful, Gracie," Ginny said. "You know, you're much better than your dad." She followed the compliment with a wink.

"I think so too," Gracie agreed.

"She even has his sense of humility," Reagan added with a playful eye roll.

"Grandma, do you want to come see my room?" Gracie asked enthusiastically, her eyes widening. "I got new posters for my birthday."

"I absolutely will, sweetheart. Can I talk to your mom for a bit, first? Just Grandma and Mom?"

Reagan felt herself choke on the spit she'd been in the midst of swallowing, fighting a cough that would have loosened up the sudden constriction of her throat. She furled her hands into fists that rested in her lap as her heart started to pound and the room spun in a full loop once, indicating that something was about to happen.

Either Ginny was going to unleash a bombshell first, or she would. Regardless, the time had clearly arrived for Reagan to get up on her soapbox and confess the feelings she'd kept barred from anyone else's knowledge.

"Okay," Gracie said without protest. She jumped and gingerly laid her bass flat, wiping her sweaty palms on the pair of denim shorts she wore. A part of Reagan, her cowardly side, wished that Gracie would have whined or insisted that the conversation wait.

Chicken, she thought scathingly to herself.

As Gracie skipped out of the living room, Reagan brought her knees to her chest and held them there like a bodily form of a security blanket. She wrapped her arms around them, hesitant to look into Ginny's eyes.

It was Ginny who spoke first.

"You never answered my question," she said.

"Which question?" Reagan asked.

"If you were alright."

"I . . . well, it's debatable."

"Debatable?"

Reagan despised that she was already speaking in riddles. It would have been simpler to get straight to the point, but a bout of stage fright was creeping up on her. There was nothing she wanted more than to be taken seriously this time around.

"I've had a lot on my mind," she admitted slowly, finally fixing her eyes on Ginny.

"Do you want to talk about it? You already know I'm all ears."

Ginny smiled as she offered herself for listening. It was a smile so true and so kind that it was capable of enveloping anyone within a mile radius to melt. It was a smile that felt like home and by default, the feeling of home made Reagan think again of Dave.

"How is . . . how is Dave?" she asked.

Ginny's eyebrows raised slightly. "Dave? Well, he's just fine. You haven't spoke to him?"

"We talked a little after the eleventh. He called to check in. It was, um, brief."

"I can imagine. Everything that's happened has upset him quite a bit."

"Yes. It's just . . . well, all of his calls are brief."

"They are?"

Reagan instinctively released her legs and leaned in towards Ginny, feeling the flow of release start to bubble up.

"Yes, they are. And it's driving me crazy," she said.

"Rightfully so," Ginny replied with a frown. "It certainly isn't fair for him to be unkind to you."

"It's not that. He's not unkind when we talk, he's just . . . distant. Polite. And polite isn't a bad thing, but it's not him."

Ginny's expression softened, evidently from a conclusion she'd drawn. "It sounds like this might have something to do with what happened in August, with Taylor."

"I thought so, too," Reagan agreed quickly. "I did at first, at least. You know as well as I do how badly that messed him up. But it's still not the way he is — I mean, not the way he is with me. We're more open with each other than that."

"You should tell him how you feel. He's still Gracie's father, after all. And you both have always had a good relationship despite the divorce."

The advice was well-meaning and it made sense. It had to have been only the tip of the iceberg of all the ways that Ginny could advise her, but Reagan needed more. They had barely scratched the surface of what she was really feeling when it came to Dave.

The situation hardly concerned wanting to maintain a cordial co-parenting relationship. It was much more than that.

"Ginny," Reagan said, sucking in a deep breath. Her nerve-endings tingled and her stomach flipped, but she plunged ahead anyways, seizing the perfectly presented chance in front of her. "I still love him."

Ginny appeared unperturbed by the confession. "Of course you do, honey. I know you'll both always love each other."

Scooting closer to her on the couch, Reagan gently shook her head and raised one trembling hand, dismissing Ginny's comment with a wave.

"No, I mean I love him. I'm in love with him. Still. I want to be with him. I want us to be together again, like we were."

This time, Ginny did not respond. She opened her mouth as if she were going to, but closed it after a half-second, growing silent though her face didn't hint at what she was thinking. Reagan assumed that she was being given a chance to spiel, to defend her case for why she was once again ready to reel Dave back in.

"This time is different," she began. She cleared her throat, making her voice strong to accentuate what she knew to be true. This time would be forever. "I've thought about it a lot. A lot has happened. But I think we can finally move past it."

"A lot has happened," Ginny agreed quietly.

"I know that it's my fault," Reagan continued. "I'm the one who let him go. I thought it was the right thing for us, for Gracie. It's not the right thing, though. It's never been the right option and I know it's awful that I'm just now realizing it, but I can't ignore it."

"It sounds dramatic, but . . . but I could die tomorrow. Or something crazy could happen." Reagan gestured toward the television, finally switched off after days of playing a constant cycle of 9/11 footage. "We've seen it happen. I look at my dad and I think about how unfair life is."

"Your father . . . Reagan, I'm so sorry for what he's going through," Ginny said, empathy flashing in her eyes.

"It's unfair," Reagan repeated. She blinked back unexpected tears, determined to stay strong. "My dad getting sick made me realize how unfair a lot of things are. It especially made me think of how unfair it is to Gracie to grow up without seeing her parents together."

"Don't blame yourself for that, honey. Gracie will fully understand one day why you and Dave are not together."

"It's not just that. It feels unfair to him and I, too. We love each other and . . . I'm being selfish, I know, but god I love him." A trickle of tears escaped from one of Reagan's eyes, but she didn't brush them away as she shook her head at herself. "I never stopped loving him and I wish I had told him forever ago that a piece of me is completely lost without him."

Silently, Ginny reached out and clasped Reagan's hand. Reagan squeezed it back, bolstered by the surge of strength that it gave her.

"You have the greatest son in the world," she said. "It's the greatest honor, the greatest privilege, to love him. And it's exactly why I don't think I can live without waking up to him every single day. Having him . . . make me laugh, watching him be the best dad to Gracie."

She choked on a sob when she said it, but a smile appeared on her face as she sifted through her shared memories with Dave. They took her all the way back to nineteen-ninety-one, to the little glass dome of happiness that they'd seemingly existed beneath together.

"I'm sorry to spring this on you," Reagan apologized, using the back of her hand to wipe at her dampened cheek. "I just thought you should know first. You brought him into the world and I'm thankful for that every day. I needed to tell somebody because it's been driving me crazy."

Ginny smiled, but her smile was tight. It was not tight with anger, but something else, something that Reagan couldn't discern. It made her nervous.

"I'm sorry, too," she added hurriedly, figuring a formal apology was needed. "I'll always be sorry for hurting him because I know I have. I know I can't take back anything I've done that's made this difficult for him. I think all the time about how I could have done things different, especially after the baby . . ."

Her thoughts drifted to her miscarriage, but Ginny snapped her out of them with another squeeze of her hand before they could drag her down into the wallow of sadness.

"There is nothing to be ashamed about how you handled that," she said firmly. "I know for a fact that even Dave understands."

"I know, but . . . we could still BE together if I'd just gotten a grip!"

Reagan sighed in frustration but shook her head, physically freeing it from her doubts. She'd promised herself that she wouldn't focus on the 'what-ifs' of the past — only the possibilities of the future.

"Ginny, look, I just wanted you to know. I love Dave. I'll only ever love Dave. I've loved him since I was twenty-one and there truthfully hasn't been a day that's gone by that I wavered on that. Plenty of things have gone wrong, but I want to try one more time. I'm going to try one more time."

"You're going to tell him all this?"

Reagan offered a small, teary smile. "I plan on it. I guess I was sort of practicing on you first. No better person to rehearse it in front of."

"Ah . . ." Ginny released Reagan's hand, only to grab it once again. She looked uncertain, her eyes darting back and forth across the room with obvious anxiety before they locked onto Reagan's. It wasn't the reaction that Reagan had hoped for and it spiked fear inside of her, releasing a sudden sea of unease that filled her with dread.

Ginny was obviously not happy. She wasn't unhappy either, but her expression betrayed a worry that didn't signify anything positive.

"Reagan," Ginny said, hushing her voice. "Oh, sweetheart . . ."

"What?" Reagan asked. Her heart started to pound painfully behind her ribs. "You think it's a bad idea?"

"It's not that what you think I'm thinking."

"He told you something? He told you he doesn't feel that way about me anymore?"

Ginny grabbed Reagan's other hand, holding them both aloft in the air tightly. She pressed her lips together, looking as if she'd found herself in the most awkward situation that  she could she have possibly been dealt that day.

"Reagan, Dave is seeing someone."

"Like . . . he's dating someone else?"

"Yes. Since late August, early September."

The energy of the room shifted, jolting hard enough to make everything visually tilt with a nauseating twist. Reagan forced herself to blink in an attempt to steady the unsettling whirl of her surroundings. Everything had abruptly taken on the demeanor of a surrealist painting.

She very suddenly felt disassociated from her own body.

"I . . . didn't know." Her words sounded foreign rolling off her tongue.

"I thought you did," Ginny said dolefully. "I assumed he'd told you."

Dave had definitely not told Reagan anything. Between the phone calls and their encounters for the sake of trading Gracie off, he had never once mentioned the presence of a new woman in his life.

It dawned on Reagan that Gracie had likely met this woman. Had Dave told her not to tell her mother about it? How massive of a secret was she actually confronting?

As if reading her mind, Ginny jumped in with an explanation.

"Gracie doesn't even truly know. She's met her, but she isn't aware of . . . the situation."

Still swaying on the couch, Reagan gently released one of her hands from Ginny's grasp to drape it across her forehead. It hardly helped with the omnipresent sensation that she was tumbling through space and time.

"Her name is Jordyn," Ginny continued, sliding closer to Reagan to tuck an arm around her waist. "She's a very nice girl. He met her over the summer. They reconnected after Taylor was in the hospital."

Reagan tried to imagine the invisible stranger she'd lost against. It was hard to piece together the face of someone she only knew by name, but she imagined that she was beautiful, probably a million times more beautiful than she was. Youthful and airy, a ray of sunshine that could not be competed with. Knowing Dave, she was probably the opposite of everything that Reagan was.

She didn't know if that was a good or bad thing.

"Does he love her?" she asked numbly. She didn't expect Ginny to answer honestly, but knew that she would mercifully do so anyway.

Ginny hesitated. "Yes," she finally said softly. "He loves her very much. She makes him incredibly happy."

As badly as her insides screamed, there was a shred of relief in finally finding out why Dave had been icing her out. It wasn't that he'd decided to hate her — he was just hiding a girlfriend from her. Or maybe not a girlfriend, but something more. His key to a new future.

A future that kept Reagan at bay forevermore as the ex-wife and mother to his kid. Nothing more and nothing less.

It was gone. Any lasting chance she'd had of being with him again was gone. It felt useless to imagine the potential in him breaking up with this Jordyn. No matter the possibility, he'd finally found it in himself to fall in love again, and telling from the tepid look on Ginny's face, it was serious. A hell of a lot more serious than Reagan had felt when she'd been with Jesse.

Her love for Dave felt all at once maimed, shunted backwards into the deepest, darkest recesses of her mind and heart. It went unwillingly into its prison, declaring that it would never go away, but it would have to dutifully remain out of sight.

Eight years of the sweetest love she'd ever known, finally put to rest. The end of a book, the story finally closed. An unhappy ending.

"Okay," Reagan said lifelessly. She bobbed her head up and down. "Okay. That's good. Good for him. I wish he would just tell me, especially with Gracie involved, but good. I mean, great. He found someone. He deserves that. To be happy."

She was well aware that she was beginning to ramble, but nothing inside her insisted that she stop. The overflow of babble helped to restrain her from completely losing it. She stood up off the couch, pulling the hem of her shirt down and fiddling with her phone in her back pocket.

"Reagan . . ." Ginny reached towards her, saying her name in a voice that was thickened with pain.

Or it might have been pity.

"No, really. This is great. I want him to be happy and if this — I mean, if Jordyn — if she makes him happy, that makes me happy."

Reagan started to pace. Her skin felt hot, burning with the heat of her rejection and heartache. She was trying to ignore the flash of her memories with Dave, all of them racing through her head like the most depressing film of all time, but talking as much as she was wasn't making them dissipate.

"He should really tell me soon. And I hope Gracie likes her. Well, she must like her if she hasn't said anything. She's so aware of everyone else around her even though she's still so young and she wouldn't want me to be upset. But I bet she's happy for Dave. Just like I'm happy for Dave. I'm so happy for him."

It was then that Ginny got up, grabbing Reagan by the shoulders and gently forcing her to stand still, facing her.

"Reagan," Ginny repeated.

Something about hearing her name again, spoken with as much agony as she was feeling, caused the shabbily assembled facade she'd put together to crack.

Reagan uttered only one word, over and over as she allowed herself to crumble into Ginny's embrace with a sob that blended into a series of muffled, broken cries. She spoke it between her weeping, choking on the burning pain of it — no.