Todos los capítulos de Among the Quiet Ruins: Capítulo 41 - Capítulo 50

Lola pov Fear didn’t arrive loudly.It didn’t knock, didn’t demand, didn’t announce itself with panic or urgency.It settled.Lola felt it one morning while standing in the doorway of Elara’s room, watching her daughter sleep. The soft rise and fall of Elara’s chest was steady, reassuring. The room smelled faintly of baby lotion and clean cotton.Everything was calm.And that was the problem.Lola pressed her fingers lightly to the doorframe, grounding herself as a thought surfaced—quiet but sharp.What if this breaks

Melvin pov Melvin didn’t realize how much he’d been holding back until Lola reached for him without fear.Not urgency.Not expectation.Choice.The night she invited him in something in him loosened. Not the careful restraint he’d been practicing, but a deeper tension he hadn’t named.The one built from years of survival.Grief had taught him how to endure quietly. Responsibility had taught him how to stay useful. But vulnerability, true vulnerability had never been required of him.Until now.He felt it the next morning while standing at

Lola pov The happiness arrived the next morning.That was what unsettled her most.Not the intimacy.Not the closeness.Not even the vulnerability.It was the way she woke up without dread.Sunlight spilled through the curtains, warm and unintrusive. Elara stirred softly in her room, a familiar sound that grounded Lola instantly. Her body felt relaxed not heavy, not tense. Just… at ease.She lay there for a moment, staring at the ceiling.Nothing hurt.Nothing felt broken.Nothing demanded explanation.And that scared her.Happiness, Lola had learned, was rarely loud. But it was often temporary. Fleeting. Something you enjoyed quickly before life corrected the imbalance.She swung her legs over the side of the bed and stood, moving through her morning routine with a lightness she didn’t fully trust.As she poured coffee, her phone buzzed.A message from Melvin.Good morning. I hope today feels gentle to you.She stared at the screen longer than necessary.Not because she didn’t want

Melvin pov Melvin hadn’t expected his boundary to arrive quietly.He thought it would come wrapped in tension, in discomfort, in the familiar tightening that preceded difficult conversations. Instead, it came to him while standing at the grocery store, staring at the cereal aisle with Elara’s favorite box balanced under his arm.The thought landed gently but firmly.I need to say something.Not because something was wrong.Because something mattered.He placed the cereal in the cart and continued shopping, the realization settling into his chest with unexpected calm. Lola had asserted her boundary without apology or defensiveness. She had trusted him with her truth.Now it was his turn.Lola pov Lola noticed the shift in Melvin the moment he walked through the door that evening.It wasn’t distance.It wasn’t tension.It was intention.He moved with a kind of grounded clarity she recognized—because she had felt it herself only days before.“Everything okay?” she asked lightly as he h

Melvin pov Melvin first noticed it in the way he listened.Not to Lola.Not to himself.To Elara.She was talking to him about a dream she had the night before, her words tumbling over one another in that earnest, unfiltered way children had. Something about flying and losing a shoe and landing in a place that smelled like pancakes.He knelt in front of her, tying her sneakers, nodding along with the seriousness her story deserved.And suddenly, something inside him shifted.He was not visiting this moment.He was in it.That realization carried weight. Not fear. Responsibility.Belonging.He had spent months being careful not to imagine this too clearly. Not because he did not want it, but because imagining implied intent. And intent implied obligation.But now, obligation did not feel like a trap.It felt like purpose.Lola pov Lola watched the interaction from the kitchen doorway.She had grown used to Melvin’s presence, but this felt different. He was not entertaining Elara. He