Hudson raises one eyebrow, questioning my hesitation.
“You don’t want to hear about that,” I say softly.
“Why not?”
I laugh quietly. “Why would you want to listen to a stranger’s problems?”
My glass is empty. Hudson leans forward and pours me a glass. “I’ll make a deal with you.”
“Oh?” I ask. “And what is that?”
“I will trade you. A problem for a problem. You tell me one of yours, I’ll tell you one of mine, and we’ll go back and forth until we can’t think of any more problems or we’re too drunk to talk.”
“Why would you do that?”
Hudson shrugs. “Everyone needs someone to listen to them. I’m not an exception to that rule.” He grins at me. “So, are you in?”
4
Hudson
I cannot stop looking at this woman in front of me. The firelight is painting her like a fucking masterpiece, catching the reds in her hair and making her practically glow. There’s not a time in my recent memory that I can remember being this captivated by anyone. Everything about her is intriguing. From the way she’s curled into the corner of the couch to the way that she’s clinging to that glass of whiskey like it’s a lifeline.
She believes what she’s saying—that I wouldn’t be interested in what she has to say or listening to her at all.
Nothing could be further from the truth. I want to dig into who she is and find out what it is that’s drawing me like a moth to a flame. I’ll listen to anything that she has to say purely for the chance to hear her talk. Erin’s voice is musical and lovely.
“Okay,” she finally nods after thinking about my offer for a bit. “A problem for a problem.”
“So tell me why you’re really here then?”
She sighs. “I’m here because my parents thought it would be good for me. They worried that I would just sit on the couch all weekend and watch Netflix, and they’re not wrong. Though before doing this,” she gestures to the two of us, the drinks, and the fire, “I was seriously regretting the decision to come.”
“Glad I could make it more bearable,” I say with a smile.
“You’re the only part that’s been bearable,” Erin says quietly, though she doesn’t meet my eyes when she says it.
I take a drink of whiskey and focus hard on not getting hard. “Okay, my first problem. I don’t know where I fit in at Blue Mountain anymore. I love it here, but things have changed a lot since my best friends—the other owners—have both fallen in love and are about to get married. Not that I’m not happy for them…” I trail off.
“But things are different.”
“They are,” I say. “Different isn’t always bad. It’s just hard to get used to.”
Erin takes a sharp sip of her whiskey and turns more fully to face me with her legs crossed. “The reason I’m working at the clinic, and my parents think that I’m working too hard, is that I applied to veterinary school and…I didn’t get in. There wasn’t any alternate plan in my mind than getting in. And now I feel so fucking lost. I thought I’d worked hard enough, and I didn’t. Now I need all the extra experience I can get so that when I apply again, I can actually get accepted.”
All the words rush out of her like she just burst a bubble. She’s breathing a little hard, cheeks flushed. I’m not sure if the whiskey is hitting her or if it’s just all the emotions around what she said. But we’re trading problems, and I’m not going to let her get bogged down in her shit. Not yet.
“I’ve been spending more and more time in the woods just so I don’t have to deal with everything that’s changing,” I admit. “It’s easier when I’m the only person for miles and I don’t have to think about anything other than which path to take or if it’s time to camp for the night. Just be, for a while.”
Erin shakes her head. “It was my test results. I’ve always been a bad tester. I know my stuff, but when there’s so much pressure and it actually matters and I know that I’m being judged on it, I overthink everything and it ends up fucking me over. It’s always been that way.”
I nod. “I know a bit about that. Ever since Leo and Asher found their partners, I’ve been lonely and second guessing everything. Even though I never thought that that kind of life was for me.”
She leans toward me and I don’t know if she consciously realizes it. “It’s embarrassing. I’ve wanted to be a vet since I was a kid, and everyone knows it. So the fact that I’m not, even if it’s still an option in the future—it feels like failure. I haven’t even told some of my friends because I don’t want to see that look in their eyes. The pity and the ‘I don’t know what to say’ or ‘Oh, I’m sure it will be okay.’”