Chapter 84
Nate
Who is this man?
No genuinely,who?
Honestly, I'm still trying to understand it. Tristan came back from Stone Lake different. Not unrecognizable, not reborn into someone new, but changed in a way that's subtle at first and then impossible to miss.
The core of him is the same—broad-shouldered, broody, dry humor, emotionally constipated…hell he still flinches here and there when I brush his hand in public, and I told him he didn't have to force anything he wasn't ready for—but he only shook his head and said he wanted to try.
That hasn't magically evaporated.
I didn't argue. If he's willing to work toward something real, I'm not going to take that away from him.
The real change is when we're alone.
Something is different.
There's a looseness to him now, subtle but unmistakable.
A softness that wasn't there before, as if someone finally unclenched a fist around his heart and let him breathe again.
