The room is dim, swathed in a heavy quiet that presses on Rue's chest, making it hard to breathe. The muted lighting softens the edges of the polished wood and stone, casting shadows over the rows of solemn faces, strangers' faces. She sits at the back, feeling untethered and alone in a room full of people who never knew him the way she did—people who only saw what he was on the surface, the stories they'd heard, the mistakes he couldn't outrun.
There was no one else he would've gone to after he killed his father. No one else he would've broken down in front of, silent and scared, holding on to her as if she were the last thing keeping him from unraveling entirely.
Her hands shake in her lap, gripping the folded piece of cardstock she's holding—the photo, a fresh print of that Polaroid she'd taken one morning when the light was just right, and she'd caught him off guard, laughing in bed beside her. She almost can't bring herself to move, to make her way to the front where his casket lies open, where his mother sits ramrod straight, face carved from stone. Marsha hates her, and Rue hates her right back. This woman had been his mother in name, but she'd never known Nate the way Rue did. She never saw the way he softened, the rare glimpses of something raw and good beneath his rage, his armor.
Finally, when the ache in her chest becomes unbearable, Rue forces herself to her feet. She doesn't know if she's trembling from grief or fear or the weight of what she's come here to say, but she moves, one foot in front of the other, all the way down the aisle. Her vision blurs as she gets closer, until she can barely make out his face in the coffin, too still, too unfamiliar, dressed in a dark suit that's all wrong for him. It feels like a lie, like everything about this is pretending he was someone he wasn't.
She doesn't look at Marsha, or at anyone else in the room. Her focus is on him, her Nate, and when she stands over him, she opens her mouth to speak, her voice cracking with every word.
"I love you, Nate," she whispers, and the sound of her voice in the quiet chapel feels like it might tear her apart. "Always. Even now… even after everything. I'll always love you."
Tears spill over, blurring her vision completely, and she lets them fall, doesn't bother wiping them away as she reaches into her pocket and pulls out the photo. She places it beside him, tucked gently against the side of his cold hand. Her fingers brush against his, and she almost pulls back, the chill of his skin a harsh reminder of the finality of this. She feels like she's dying, too, leaving part of herself behind with him.
This picture, she tells herself, is for him. But the other one—the original, the one where he'd scrawled his apology in that familiar messy handwriting before he did this—is safely kept in her bedroom, hidden away. He's left her with something she never expected, something that will be impossible to keep secret for much longer. Her heart aches with the knowledge of it, with the life growing inside her, the last piece of him she'll ever have.
Rue remembers the day she learned her future was going to be different than she imagined. The bright lights of a hospital room after her last overdose. The way the nurse looked at her, once she had another moment alone. It was difficult to do, considering how tightly her mom and Gia held on to her.
As Rue stands there, her hand trembling on the edge of the casket, a sob breaks loose, ripping out of her before she can hold it back. She's drowning in it, in the pain of it, the loss, and she doesn't know how she's supposed to survive this. She turns, stumbling back down the aisle, clutching her stomach, her sobs echoing in the stillness of the room, raw and guttural, breaking open her chest with every step she takes.
She almost doesn't notice the hand that reaches out to steady her, soft but firm, grounding her. It's Maddy, her face streaked with tears, eyes full of an understanding Rue hadn't expected. Maddy holds her as she crumbles, arms wrapping around her tightly, offering support in a moment Rue didn't even know she needed.
Rue looks back one last time, vision blurred but needing to see him, needing to remember. She leans down and presses a shaky kiss to his cold lips, her tears falling onto his still face, mingling with the salt on her tongue. She can't say goodbye.
And when she finally lets go, when Maddy leads her out, Rue feels the weight of his absence settle into her bones. He's gone, but part of him lives on, a heartbeat inside her, a secret she'll carry with her for as long as she has the strength to keep it.
In the quiet that follows, as the chapel empties and the doors close, there is only her grief, raw and endless, filling the silence he's left behind.