Chapter 5 - The Glass House
Damon’s "residence" in Denver was a sprawling penthouse overlooking the city skyline, a sterile, glass-enclosed palace of minimalist design. It was everything he had built for himself: cold, beautiful, and utterly empty.
He watched as Cassandra and the twins walked in. Violet immediately began to crawl toward the plush white rug, while Luke looked at the floor-to-ceiling windows with wonder.
"It’s like a rocket ship," Luke said.
Damon watched them, a profound sense of melancholy settling over him. He had spent his entire adult life creating a space that looked like success, and now that the people who mattered most were inside it, he realized how wrong it was. There were no toys. There were no books. There was no life.
"I’ll get the guest room ready," Damon said, moving to pull out a designer chair for Cassandra.
"Don't bother," she said, her voice neutral. She looked around the apartment, her expression one of polite disdain. "It’s very… you, Damon. Sterile. Expensive. And entirely cold."
"I can change it," he said, desperate to please.
"You can't change who you are," she replied. She sat down on the leather sofa, her body sagging with fatigue. "How did you get here? I mean, really? How did you go from the guy who shared a single bagel in the morning to… this?"
Damon sat down opposite her, leaving the coffee table between them like a barricade. "I worked. I stayed up until four AM, I leveraged every connection I had, and I didn't stop until the noise in my head went away."
"What noise?"
"The noise of the life I lost," he said. "The noise of you leaving."
Cassandra looked at him, her eyes searching his. "You didn't have to build an empire, Damon. You just had to tell me you were scared. You just had to tell me you didn't know how to do this."
"I didn't know how to do 'this'," he said, gesturing to the empty, echoing room. "I didn't know how to be a person who was enough."
"You were enough," she said, her voice barely a whisper. "You were always enough."
The twins were playing on the floor now, stacking designer coasters into a wobbling tower. Damon watched them, his heart aching. He had the money to buy them anything—every toy, every school, every luxury—but he couldn't buy back the three years he had missed. He couldn't buy back their first words, their first steps, their first cries in the night.
"I'm going to set up a nursery," Damon said suddenly, standing up. "I’ll have people here tomorrow morning. I’ll have the best, most beautiful nursery in the city."
"Damon," she said, her voice gentle but firm. "They don't need a nursery. They need a father who stays."
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"I am staying," he said.
"We'll see," she replied. She reached down and picked up Luke, who was starting to get sleepy. "We'll see."
