Chapter 29

On the night of the combined bachelor and bachelorette plans, Harriet cannot stand the uncertainty anymore. She walks to the guesthouse and finds Wyn in the outdoor shower. Overwhelmed, she admits the lack of answers is destroying her and recounts how the breakup felt like abandonment without explanation.

Wyn comforts Harriet and explains that after Hank’s death he fell into a dark, depressive spiral. Feeling inadequate beside Harriet’s demanding new life and friends, and misreading her careful composure as indifference, he convinced himself she would be happier without him. He ended things quickly to avoid backtracking and later started antidepressants, realizing his depression was longstanding.

Harriet apologizes for not knowing how to handle pain and confesses she kissed and even slept with someone else while trying—and failing—to stop feeling like she belonged to Wyn. Wyn insists he never stopped loving her and still feels they belong to each other, though he believed they could not go back.

Despite knowing their lives remain geographically and practically separate, they admit mutual love. Passion overtakes them in the shower: they kiss, undress, and Wyn brings Harriet to climax, but they stop short of intercourse due to not having a condom. They decide to get dinner and postpone the rest, ending with tenderness and the sense of one more day together but no concrete plan.