“Why didn’t you fight for it?” she asks, a single tear rolling down her cheek. “Why didn’t you fight for us?”
It’s a fair question, even though I could turn it around on her. As I look at her across the porch, the gentle summer breeze playing with the ends of her hair, my heart squeezes with the answer to her question.
“I didn’t fight for us then because of pride. I didn’t fight for us through the years because of anger. I’m not fighting for us now because my heart is so tied up in Sienna that nothing else exists.”
“Maybe we could fix things? Maybe we could fall in love again?” she asks, the words squeezed around the emotion filling the spaces between the words. “I miss you so much.”
I hold her gaze for a split second before raising a finger. I go inside, flip on the light, and head to the old secretary’s desk that used to be my mother’s. There’s a file at the bottom of the cavity, the little flags indicating spots for signature. I take it and a black ballpoint pen and head back to the porch.
Tabby is standing in the same spot, black trails streaming down her cheeks.
“I need you to sign here and here,” I say, placing the file on a little table and showing her the spots with flags with “TG” tagged on them by Blaire.
She doesn’t move. “You’re so handsome, Walker. You remind me so much of your dad.”
“Tabby . . .”
“I wondered if I’d come out here and you’d start throwing cans of pop out the door at my car the way you and Lance did that night of the bonfire at Tommy Jones’. Remember that?” she grins through the tears. “My God, you guys were horrible.”
“He deserved everything he got,” I say, remembering that night.
“Yeah, he did.” She pulls her hair into a small ponytail at the back of her neck before wiping her face with the back of her hands. “You’ve really turned into a good man.” Her lip quivers, the tip of her nose turning red. “Sienna is a lucky woman.”
Without another word, just a sniffle as she tries not to dot the divorce papers with her tears, she takes the pen and signs her name to both spots.
“Tell Sienna I’m sorry,” she says, climbing down the stairs. “And Walker?”
“Yeah?”
“I’m sorry to you too.”
She gets into her car and backs down the driveway, honking the horn once before speeding away. I pull out my phone again, this time opening the texting app.
There are lines and lines of green text bubbles from the course of the night, all filled with me apologizing, begging her to call, begging her to text, me trying to explain. I don’t know what else to even say. Still, I can’t help but punching out another one.
ME: If you need someone to talk to and don’t want to talk to me, call Peck. Please. Just let someone know you’re okay.
RAIN PELTS THE WINDOW, a summer storm rolling in just as I got home. Sitting on the sofa, gazing out the window, I wonder if it’s a reflection of the weather outside or if I’m just imagining what my heart looks like.
Battered. Gloomy. Branches snapping off as they’re flung back and forth.
My coffee went cold a long time ago, but I still grip the mug in my hands. It’s like a life raft at this point. Something to root me in the present so I don’t get lost in the past.
Climbing into bed earlier, his scent was all over the sheets and pillows. It would’ve been smart to get right back out. I think logical thinking was lost somewhere around two am. Curling up in the sheets, my face buried in the pillow he used, I whipped back and forth from crying to being so angry my fist hit the mattress again and again. I laid there long enough to get out of it with his cologne on my shirt.
My feet are cold against the hardwood, but I can’t bring myself to find socks. If I can just stay in this half-muted state, I’ll be better off.
There are so many decisions to be made and I ignore them all. What to do about the upcoming lease? Do I take Graham’s offer after all? Do I bother talking to Walker or do I just skip town and forget this place ever existed at all?
Coffee sloshes in the mug as a score of emotions wave over me. The smell of Carlson’s bakery, the sweet smile of the librarian, making pies with the little old ladies, and the feel of Crank in the morning all roll by, taunting me that I wasn’t part of this place as I once thought.
My phone buzzes next to me and I look down, expecting it to be Walker for the eighteenth time since I woke up and turned it on. There were too many calls and texts last night to even process and I haven’t read any of the messages or listened to the voice messages either. I reach for it and see it’s Cam.