I fell to my knees. I fell hard, with a crack of bone to wood that made Mary’s eyes well with tears. She looked up to try to keep them from falling, but they seared down her cheeks, anyway. “Don’t go.” They were the only words I could say, the only ones that made sense in my scrambled brain. I could say I was sorry a million times, I could promise her the whole world — but the one thing I needed her to hear above anything else was that I wanted her to stay. I needed her to stay.
