Updated Apr 11, 2026 • ~8 min read
Chapter 20: Last Night
Sloane
Our last night.
I’m acutely aware of every moment, every touch, every breath. Tomorrow morning we’ll hike to the extraction point, the helicopter will come, and I’ll leave. I’ll fly away from this cabin, from this wilderness, from him, and nothing will be the same ever again.
We make love slowly, desperately, with an emotional intensity that makes tears stream down my face even as pleasure builds in my core. This is goodbye. No matter what promises we’ve made, no matter what we’ve said about me coming back, this feels like an ending.
Jackson moves above me, inside me, and I try to memorize every sensation—the weight of him, the heat of his skin, the way he whispers my name like a prayer. His hands are gentle despite the desperation I can feel thrumming through him, and when he presses his forehead to mine, I can feel that he’s crying too.
“Come with me,” I whisper, and I know it’s hopeless but I have to try one more time. “Come back with me. To the city. Just for a little while. We can figure it out together—”
“To the city?” He pulls back to look at me, and his eyes are devastated. “Sloane, I can’t. You know I can’t.”
“Why not? Just for a few days, just to—”
“Because I’ll have a panic attack in the airport. Because the noise and the crowds and the constant sensory overload will trigger my PTSD so badly I’ll be non-functional. Because I’ll be a burden and a liability and you’ll spend all your time taking care of me instead of wrapping up your life.” His voice breaks. “I can’t do it. I’ve tried. After I got out, before I came here, I tried to make it work in Denver. Lasted two months before I couldn’t take it anymore. I’m not built for civilization anymore.”
“Then I’ll stay here,” I say desperately. “I don’t need to go back. I can call my firm, email my resignation, have someone pack up my apartment—”
“You’d hate it eventually.” He’s pulling away now, physically and emotionally, and I can feel him slipping through my fingers. “You’d resent me for keeping you here, trapped in the wilderness, cut off from everything you know. Just like—”
He stops himself, but I know what he was going to say.
“Just like your ex,” I finish quietly. “The one who left after six months.”
“Her name was Sarah.” He rolls off me, sitting on the edge of the bed with his back to me. “We met in the service—she was a medic, I was a Ranger. We fell in love in Afghanistan, survived combat together, thought we could survive anything. When I got out and came here, she came with me. Swore she loved me enough to handle the isolation.”
I sit up, wrapping the blanket around myself, and wait for him to continue.
“First few months were good. She was tough, capable, handled the wilderness better than I expected. But then winter hit. Real winter, the kind where you’re trapped inside for weeks at a time, where the temperature doesn’t get above zero for months, where the sun barely rises and sets in the same day.” His voice is hollow. “She started getting depressed. Quiet. Would cry when she thought I wasn’t looking. And I knew—I knew I was killing her by keeping her here, but I couldn’t leave. The mountains were the only place my PTSD was manageable.”
“What happened?” I ask softly.
“She left in March. Said she couldn’t do it anymore, that she loved me but she loved herself more, and staying here was slowly destroying her.” He finally turns to look at me, and the pain in his eyes is so raw it hurts to see. “She was right to leave. I should have let her go sooner, should have seen what this life was doing to her. But I was selfish, wanted to believe love would be enough.”
“I’m not Sarah,” I say, moving to sit beside him. “I’m not someone who loved city life trying to adapt to the wilderness. I’m someone who’s been miserable in the city finding peace in the wilderness. There’s a difference.”
“Maybe.” He doesn’t sound convinced. “Or maybe the novelty just hasn’t worn off yet. Maybe you don’t really understand what it means to be here long-term, through the winter, through the isolation, through months of the same four walls and the same person and no escape.”
“You don’t know that I can’t handle it—”
“I do.” He takes my hand, and his grip is gentle but firm. “Because Sarah was tough too. Tougher than you, maybe—she grew up rural, knew how to hunt and fish and survive. If she couldn’t handle it, I don’t think you can either.”
The words land like a slap, and I pull my hand away. “That’s not fair.”
“It’s honest.” He stands, pulling on his clothes like he can’t bear to be vulnerable anymore. “And you deserve honesty, even if it hurts. I love you too much to let you make the same mistake Sarah did. Too much to watch you slowly come to hate this place and hate me.”
“You love me?” The words slip out before I can stop them.
He freezes, and I can see the exact moment he realizes what he just said.
“Yeah,” he says quietly. “I love you. I have for a while now. And that’s why I can’t ask you to stay. That’s why I can’t come with you. That’s why this has to end here, before it destroys us both.”
“You’re wrong,” I whisper through tears. “You’re wrong about me, wrong about us, wrong about everything. But you’re so convinced you’re right that you won’t even let me try to prove you wrong.”
“Better to end it now while we still love each other than wait until we hate each other.” He’s putting on his jacket now, moving toward the door. “I’m going to sleep outside tonight. Give us both some space.”
“Jackson, don’t—”
“It’s better this way.” He doesn’t look at me. “Tomorrow we’ll hike to the extraction point, you’ll get on the helicopter, and you’ll go back to your life. And in a few weeks or months, when you’ve had time to process everything, you’ll realize I was right. That this was never going to work. That it was just a beautiful impossible dream.”
“And what if you’re wrong?” I’m crying openly now. “What if I come back in a month and prove to you that I can handle this life, that I want this life, that I choose you? What then?”
“Then I guess I’ll have been wrong.” He finally looks at me, and I’ve never seen him look so broken. “But I don’t think I am.”
And then he’s gone, the door closing behind him, leaving me alone in the cabin with my tears and my rage and my heartbreak.
I don’t sleep.
I lie in the bed that still smells like him and cry until I have no tears left, and then I just stare at the ceiling and try to figure out how everything went so wrong so fast.
He loves me.
He said it. Actually said it out loud. But his love isn’t enough to make him trust me, to believe in us, to take the risk that maybe—just maybe—we could make this work.
And I love him enough to let him push me away if that’s really what he needs, even though it’s tearing me apart.
But I’m coming back.
I don’t care what he thinks, don’t care that he’s convinced I’ll change my mind, don’t care that he’s already grieving us as if we’re dead.
I’m going to go back to New York, quit my job, pack up my life, and come back here. And when I do, he’s going to have to face the fact that he was wrong about me, wrong about us, wrong about everything.
Even if it takes months. Even if it takes years. Even if I have to prove my commitment every single day for the rest of our lives.
I’m coming back.
And I’m going to make him believe it.
The night drags on forever, and when the first light of dawn starts creeping through the window, I hear Jackson come back inside. He moves quietly, probably thinking I’m asleep, and I close my eyes and pretend he’s right.
I can’t face him right now. Can’t look at him knowing that in a few hours we’re going to say goodbye, possibly forever, because he’s too damaged to believe that good things can last.
So I lie still and breathe steadily and listen to him move around the cabin, and I try to memorize the sounds—the creak of the floorboards, the soft huff of Bear’s breathing, the crackle of the fire Jackson is rebuilding.
These are the sounds of home.
And in a few hours, I’m going to have to leave them behind.
But I swear to myself, lying there in the pre-dawn darkness: this is not the end.
This is just the beginning of the fight for us.
And I’ve never lost a fight in my life.
I’m not about to start now.
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