All Chapters of All the Love That Never Landed: Chapter 1 - Chapter 10

It was almost dawn when Mom finally sent a single message.[Stop calling. Blythe gets upset just seeing your number come up.]After that, I made four little dolls in their likenesses. They kept me company at meals and at bedtime. They listened when I talked about every small improvement, and they listened when I needed to say the sad things I had no one else to tell.Yet as the tears fell now, I did not reach for them. After walking alone in the dark for so long, I had finally found the courage to stop looking back.I stood there and looked around the apartment properly for the first time in the year I had lived there. The paint was peeling in patches, exposing the pale gray concrete underneath. The curtains had been washed so many times that they had gone stiff, and the edges still carried mildew stains that would not come out. The old air conditioner overhead rattled and hummed, but the only thing it blew out was warm air.During the hottest months of exam prep, I sat at the d

The next day, I went to my part-time job at the milkshake shop as usual. My regular task was to wear the mascot costume and hand out flyers in front of the mall.The midday sun was brutal, and the heavy suit was suffocating. When I could not take it anymore, I pulled off the headpiece and crouched in a corner to drink some water."Darcy?"A familiar voice came from behind me. My hands went still, and I turned around.My parents, Gary, Callum, and Blythe were all standing a short distance away. Even Callum's parents were there. Gary and Callum had their hands full of shopping bags. There was no need to guess who they were for.Mom saw me drenched in sweat, but there was not a trace of concern in her eyes, only embarrassment and anger."Darcy, have I not been giving you money? You're out here dressed like this, handing out flyers. Are you trying to make people think we mistreat you?"My grip on the water bottle tightened. "You give me 1,000 dollars a month, and 800 of that goes to

At that moment, the Sheridans' living room was buzzing.Blythe's acceptance letter sat in the center of the coffee table. Mom had read it over and over, barely able to contain the smile in her eyes. "Our Blythe really came through. This whole year was worth it."Dad was smiling too, which was rare for him. He scrolled through hotel options on his phone. "Since both girls got into university, let's make the celebratory dinner a proper event. We'll invite all our relatives and friends, give everyone something to be happy about."Gary sat nearby, texting his classmates. "I already checked. The ballroom at Aston Hotel is pretty nice, but the timing's a little tight."Callum was there too. He held his phone with his thumb hovering over the group chat conversation. The last message was the one he had sent.[I'll come pick you up.]There was no reply.He frowned and was about to send another message when a notification from the family group chat appeared at the top of his screen.[D

The day I arrived in Dunmore, it was raining lightly. It was crowded outside the station. As I pulled my suitcase toward the exit, the wheels traced wet lines across the ground with a quiet hiss.No one was there to pick me up. No one stood in the crowd calling my name. However, I was not sad at all.For years, I had always been waiting for Mom and Dad to turn around and look at me, for Gary to say one kind thing, and for Callum to remember that he had once promised to wait for me too.It was only after I stopped waiting that I realized how much lighter everything felt.When I powered on my phone, the screen flooded with over a dozen missed calls from Mom, Dad, Gary, and Callum. I looked at them for a while, my fingertip resting on the screen.If this had been before, I would have called back immediately, despite the fact that I knew that whatever waited on the other end was most likely blame. This time, however, I swiped every notification away and switched the phone back to sile

Half a month later, Callum finally tracked me down and came to Dunmore.I had just walked out of the library that day when I looked down and saw him standing at the bottom of the steps. He had lost weight, and the shadows under his eyes were deep and dark. The moment he saw me, the tension in his body seemed to release all at once."Darcy." He crossed the distance quickly, his voice rough. "I've been looking everywhere for you."I stopped walking but did not run toward him the way I used to. I just looked at him, calm. "What do you need?"Callum faltered. He probably had not expected me to speak to him like that. The old version of me could be furious one second and still soften her voice for him the next.He tightened his grip on what he was holding and said quietly, "Darcy, I was wrong. You should've gone to Stratton."He held out the postcard. It was the same one, but it had been taped back together. The creases were still deep. The strip of tape ran straight across the middle