I rolled over to my stomach and leaned my chin against his bare chest, waggling my eyebrows suggestively. “Probably had something to do with the page number and the promise of one such action if I finished early tonight. Which I did.”

He cupped the back of my head and kissed my forehead. “Your big, beautiful brain remains a mystery to me.”

My phone rang again from wherever it was hiding. “Well, it’s a mystery to me, too, apparently,” I said before we both jumped up to turn the comforter out. The phone hit the ground on Ryan’s side with a thud. He picked it up and handed it to me with a cocked eyebrow.

I shrugged and laughed. “Hey, you found it.”

His answering smile was warm and indulgent, as if he loved even this messy part of me. As if he could spend the rest of his life with me, between sheets and pages and words, discussing symbols and looking for my phone.

And maybe I could let him.

An unexpected pang of sadness at the memory catches me completely off guard. I rub at my chest as if that could ease the pain there, but my lungs squeeze all the air out of them when I click the screen on and Ryan’s name appears with three messages.

Ryan: Scarlett, it’s 2am.

Ryan: Please tell me you haven’t been working this whole time.

Ryan: This book isn’t that important.

He’s clearly worried, and I should ease his fear about me falling back into my old ways, but the truth of the matter is, minus his physical presence here, this is exactly how it used to be, no matter how hard I’ve tried to tell myself it’s different this time. He knows that because he was here with me then, even if he’s not now.

What bothers me more is how easy it is for him to dismiss the importance of this book. It’s not a comeback for him. It’s not really anything for him except another part of the job he already has—the one he’s had this whole time while I’ve been trying to find any kind of purchase on a cliff that seemed determined to move all the footholds just out of reach. For me, this book is everything. My work, my art, my identity. Who am I if I’m not Scarlett Frye, best-selling author? I’ve spent five years trying to figure that out, only to come to the conclusion that I’m no one and nothing without my words.

And so, here I am again. Back where I started and having to come to terms with the fact that this might be how it always is.

Scarlett: It’s important to me.

The message is too simple, even as it holds volumes of words unsaid.