The cabin is too quiet for a Thursday afternoon. Marcus and Jenna are arguing about something in the main room—something about a board game and whose turn it is—but the walls of our small bedroom muffle the sound until it's just noise, background static I can tune out.
Liam sits on the edge of the bed, his phone propped against a coffee mug on the nightstand, the time blinking at me: 7:42. Eighteen minutes until eight o'clock.
"You're pacing," he says.
I stop. I didn't realize I was moving.
"Sorry."
"Don't apologize." He pats the quilt beside him. "Come sit. You're making me nervous."
"You're already nervous."
"Yeah, but now I'm nervous watching you be nervous, which is a whole different thing."
I sit. The mattress dips under my weight, and his hand finds mine automatically, his thumb tracing the ridge of my knuckles like he's memorizing them. I feel the key in my pocket, the one he gave me, pressing against my thigh through the denim. I put it there this morning, deliberately, like a talisman.
"What if she doesn't like you?" I ask.
"Then I'll spend the rest of my life convincing her."
"That's not funny."
"I'm not trying to be funny." He turns my hand over, palm up, and traces the lines there. "I'm trying to tell you that I'm not going anywhere. Your mother's opinion doesn't change that."
"It changes—" I stop. Bite my lip. "It changes me. What she thinks. It always has."
He looks up at me, those pale blue eyes steady, no flinch. "I know. That's why I'm not going to make you choose."
The words land somewhere deep, somewhere I didn't know was waiting to be touched. I don't say anything. I just lean into him, my head finding the hollow of his shoulder, and he holds me there, his cheek against my hair, his breath warm and even.
Seventeen minutes.
Jenna's voice cuts through the wall: "If you roll a seven one more time, I'm flipping the board."
Marcus: "That's not how the game works."
"I'm telling you how it works now."
Liam laughs, a quiet exhale that moves through his chest and into mine. "They're going to kill each other before we even make the call."
"Maybe that's a good thing. Distraction."
"Is it working?"
I think about it. The answer surprises me. "A little."
He kisses the top of my head, and I let myself stay there, in the curve of his body, for exactly sixty seconds. Then I sit up, pull my phone out of my pocket, and check the signal bars.
Two. It's been two all day. The library in town had full bars, but we're back at the cabin now, and the video call is going to be a gamble.
"If it drops—" I start.
"Then we try again. And again. And again."
"You're very patient."
"I'm very in love." He says it simply, like it's a fact of physics, like the sun rising. "Patience is just the side effect."
I don't have words for that. So I kiss him instead, quick and soft, and then I stand up and grab my laptop from the desk.
7:49.
Eleven minutes.
I set the laptop on the small table by the window, the one with the view of the frozen lake, and I open it. The screen glows, and I navigate to the video call app, hovering over my mother's contact.
I haven't called her since the library. Since I told her about him. Since she said, in that careful voice she uses when she's trying not to react, I want to meet him.
Now she's going to.
"What if she asks about—" I stop. Swallow. "What if she asks about Maya?"
Liam stands up, crosses the room, and stands behind me, his hands settling on my shoulders. "Then we tell her the truth. That you chose me. That I chose you. That Maya is in Los Angeles, and she's not coming back."
"She'll think I'm reckless."
"She'll think you're brave."
"You don't know my mother."
"Neither do you, apparently." He squeezes my shoulders. "You haven't given her a chance to surprise you."
I stare at the screen. The cursor blinks in the contact field. Seven minutes.
"Okay," I say, more to myself than to him. "Okay."
I close the laptop, turn around, and press my forehead to his chest. He wraps his arms around me, and I breathe him in—the clean smell of his hoodie, the faint traces of woodsmoke from the fire pit, the warmth of his skin.
"I love you," I say into the fabric of his shirt.
"I love you too." His hand cups the back of my head, fingers threading through my hair. "And I'm not going anywhere. Say it."
"You're not going anywhere."
"Again."
"You're not going anywhere."
"One more time."
I pull back, look at him. "You're not going anywhere, Liam Gallagher."
He smiles, and it's the smile that undoes me, the one that reaches his eyes and stays there, and I feel the knot in my chest loosen, just a little.
6:54. Six minutes.
I open the laptop again.
The call connects at exactly eight o'clock.
For a long moment, the screen is black, just the loading icon spinning, and I hold my breath. Liam's hand finds mine on the table, his fingers threading through mine, and the key presses against my palm, caught between us.
Then the screen flickers, and my mother's face appears.
She looks the same as she always does—dark hair pulled back, the same honey-brown skin I inherited, the same watchful eyes that have been reading me since I was small enough to fit in her arms. She's sitting at the kitchen table back home, the one with the scratch on the corner where I dropped a knife when I was twelve, and behind her I can see the edge of the cabinet with the missing handle.
Home. The word hits me in the chest.
"Anak," she says, and her voice cracks on the first syllable.
"Mom." My voice is smaller than I want it to be. "I'm here."
She blinks, and for a moment she doesn't say anything. Her eyes scan the frame, moving past me, past the window, past the sliver of frozen lake visible in the corner—and then they land on Liam's hand, wrapped around mine on the table.
I watch her watch it. I watch her read the shape of his fingers, the way his thumb rests against my knuckles, the way our hands fit together like they were made to.
The silence stretches.
"He's—" She stops. Starts again. "He's older than I expected."
It's not an accusation. It's not approval either. It's a statement, flat and careful, the kind she uses when she's trying not to show her hand.
"I'm nineteen, ma'am." Liam's voice is steady, quiet, measured. "I turn twenty next month. Sofia turned eighteen in April."
"I know when my daughter's birthday is."
"Yes, ma'am. I didn't mean—" He stops. Takes a breath. "I'm sorry. I'm nervous. I've been nervous all day."
My mother's eyebrows lift, just slightly. "At least you're honest."
"I don't know how to be anything else with you. She talks about you all the time. You're—" He glances at me, just briefly, then back at the screen. "You're important to her. I don't want to mess this up."
The silence again. But it's different this time. Softer. Like the air is settling.
"Where did you meet?" my mother asks.
"Math class, ma'am." His voice doesn't waver. "First row, second seat. She sat next to me the second week of January, and I spent the rest of the semester trying to figure out how to talk to her."
"You sit in the front?"
"Yes, ma'am."
"On purpose or because it's the only seat left?"
A pause. Then: "On purpose. I like seeing the board clearly."
My mother's mouth does something that might almost be a smile. "So do I."
I feel the tension in my chest crack, just a little, and I squeeze Liam's hand. His thumb presses back, warm and solid.
"She told me you're studying engineering," my mother says.
"Yes, ma'am. I got accepted to State, and a few other places. I haven't decided yet."
"You haven't decided?"
He glances at me again, and this time I see something in his eyes—something vulnerable, something he's choosing to show. "I'm trying to figure out what comes next. Where she fits. I don't want to make a decision that takes me away from her."
My mother's face is unreadable. She's silent for a long moment, and I feel the weight of her attention shifting, moving from Liam to me, settling on my face like a hand on my cheek.
"Sofia."
"Yes, Mom?"
"Do you trust him?"
The question is simple. Direct. The kind of question she used to ask when I was small and something was wrong—Do you trust this person? Do you feel safe? She never asked it lightly.
I feel Liam's hand in mine. I feel the key in my pocket, pressing against my thigh. I feel the warmth of his body beside me, steady and sure.
"Yes," I say. "I trust him."
My mother holds my gaze for a long moment. Then she nods, once, and I see her shoulders drop, just slightly, like she's been holding a breath she didn't know she was holding.
"Okay," she says. "Then I trust you."
The words hit me like a wave. I blink, and I feel the sting of tears at the corners of my eyes, and I don't try to stop them.
"Mom—"
"I mean it." She leans closer to the camera, her face filling the frame. "I don't know him yet. But I know you. And if you say he's worth trusting, then I believe you."
I can't speak. I just nod, and Liam's hand tightens around mine, and I feel the key warm against my skin, a door I'm opening, a door that's opening for me.
"Tell me about him," my mother says, her voice softer now. "Tell me everything."
And I do.
I tell her about the first time he talked to me, about the way he remembered my coffee order before I did, about the night at the party when he got jealous and drunk and everything changed. I tell her about the key, about the way he looks at me, about the way he said I'm choosing you on a frozen lake. I tell her about Marcus and Jenna, about the cabin, about the way he held me when I was scared.
And through all of it, Liam sits beside me, quiet and steady, his hand in mine, not interrupting, not correcting, just there.
My mother listens. She asks questions—careful ones, practical ones, the kind that show she's paying attention. What does his family think? Does he have a job? What are his plans after graduation? Liam answers each one honestly, no flinching, no hedging, and I watch her face change in real time, the suspicion making way for something else, something I haven't seen in years.
She's letting him in.
We talk for an hour. By the end, my mother is laughing at something Liam said—something about his mother's cat, a story I hadn't heard before—and I feel the key in my pocket, warm and solid, a door that's not just open but welcoming.
"I want to meet you," my mother says, her voice soft, almost shy. "When you come home. Both of you."
Liam looks at me, and I nod.
"We'll be there," he says. "I promise."
My mother smiles, and it's the smile I remember from before, the one that made everything okay when I was small and scared. "Good. I'll cook."
I laugh, and it comes out wet. "You always say that."
"Because I always mean it." She pauses, her eyes moving between us, and then she says, softly: "Take care of her, Liam."
"Every day," he says. "I swear it."
My mother nods, once, and then she says goodnight, and the call ends, and the screen goes dark.
For a long moment, neither of us moves. The cabin is quiet, the only sound the crackle of the fire in the main room and the distant creak of ice on the lake.
Then I turn to him, and I see the tears in his eyes before he blinks them away.
"Hey—" I reach up, my thumb brushing the corner of his eye. "Hey."
"I'm fine." His voice cracks on the word, and he laughs, a broken sound. "I'm fine. I just—" He shakes his head. "She said she trusts you. That's—"
"I know."
"That's everything."
"I know."
I lean in, pressing my forehead to his, and we stay there, breathing together, the key between us, warm and solid and real.
"I told you," I whisper. "I told you you had nothing to worry about."
He laughs again, and this time it sounds more like him. "No, you didn't. You were pacing for eighteen minutes."
"That was pre-call nerves. That's different."
"Sure it is."
I pull back, and he's smiling, and I'm smiling, and the room feels warmer than it did an hour ago, like something has shifted, like the air itself is different.
"She liked you," I say.
"She tolerated me."
"She liked you. I know her."
He looks at me, and his eyes are soft, vulnerable, open. "Really?"
"Really."
He exhales, long and slow, and I watch the tension leave his shoulders, the weight of the last hour settling into something lighter.
"Okay," he says. "Okay."
I take his hand, my fingers finding the spaces between his, and I feel the key in my pocket, pressing against me like a promise.
"We're doing this," I say. "We're actually doing this."
He lifts my hand to his lips, presses a kiss to my knuckles, and holds my gaze.
"We're doing this," he repeats. "Together."