Chap­ter 169 begins with Char­lotte qui­et­ly flip­ping through her late mother’s recipe col­lec­tion, each card a tan­gi­ble mem­o­ry, each ingre­di­ent a reminder of a past that still lingers in every cor­ner of the house. The hand­writ­ing, slight­ly slant­ed and fad­ed at the edges, makes her pause, as though hear­ing Misty’s voice whis­per­ing through the ink. Patch watch­es from the counter, hold­ing a recipe for a strange dessert that involves bak­ing ice cream—an idea that sounds more like a dare than a dish. They pre­pare it any­way, shar­ing laugh­ter and con­fu­sion as the final result emerges from the oven, scorched and bare­ly edi­ble. Over bites of their odd cre­ation, they joke about how the cook­book belongs in a time cap­sule, or bet­ter yet, locked in the base­ment to pre­serve Misty’s more “cre­ative” culi­nary lega­cy.

Down in the base­ment, Patch shows Char­lotte a part of his life she hasn’t ful­ly seen before. The walls are cov­ered in lay­ered brushstrokes—unfinished paint­ings, half-erased sketch­es, and can­vas­es heavy with both col­or and mem­o­ry. It’s a space that speaks to his past, a kind of liv­ing muse­um of thought and feel­ing. Char­lotte runs her fin­gers along the edges of one paint­ing, then the next, try­ing to trace the sto­ry hid­den beneath the oil and graphite. But soon, fatigue wins out. She qui­et­ly says she’s tired, and Patch leads her back upstairs. In her room, she curls beneath the ceil­ing, where soft stars glow against the dark, cast­ing a mut­ed light that makes every­thing seem dream­like. She speaks soft­ly, bring­ing up a girl she once heard about—someone from Patch’s past—whose moth­er he once saved. It’s a mem­o­ry laced with rev­er­ence and mys­tery, leav­ing Patch unsure how much she tru­ly under­stands.

As they talk, Patch is struck by Char­lot­te’s blend of curios­i­ty and cau­tion. She brings up her wish for a father, a desire that once filled her thoughts, but now comes with hes­i­ta­tion. She ques­tions whether Patch is tru­ly some­one who can stay, some­one per­ma­nent in a life that has already seen so many peo­ple come and go. Her obser­va­tions hit him hard. She points out the absence of ties in his life, no deep roots, no clear sense of belong­ing. Then she turns to the top­ic of Saint and Sam­my, ask­ing about their place in his life and hint­ing at wounds she doesn’t ful­ly voice. There’s an emo­tion­al ten­sion in the room, some­thing unspo­ken hang­ing in the air like sta­t­ic.

Then Char­lotte shares a truth that Misty once told her—something that Patch hadn’t heard before. “If a heart breaks too bad­ly,” she says, “it doesn’t love the same way again. It tries, but it can’t love as big.” The words set­tle heav­i­ly between them. Patch doesn’t respond right away. He thinks about Grace, about Misty, and about the frac­tured spaces inside him­self. He won­ders if Char­lotte is right—if he’s try­ing to love her with a heart that’s still heal­ing, still afraid. But he also real­izes that love, even a bro­ken kind, can still be pow­er­ful. Some­times, show­ing up is what mat­ters most.

As Char­lotte final­ly drifts to sleep, her breath­ing slow and steady, Patch remains still beside her. He looks at her—not just as the child of some­one he once loved, but as some­one he’s begin­ning to see as his own. The room is qui­et except for the gen­tle hum of a dis­tant train and the soft tick­ing of the clock on the shelf. He leans in and whis­pers, though he knows she’s already asleep, “I’m not going any­where.” It’s not a grand promise, but it’s a start. A vow built not on cer­tain­ty but on intention—a thread of hope wrapped in all the messi­ness of what it means to be human.