Page 50 of Burn Point

I thought about Leah and Mike, Kylie, Nate, and Thoren. Was it normal to be this homesick when I’d only been gone for two weeks? Our friendship had cemented from the start, so maybe it made sense that I missed them at random times. Like now, when I spied a random group of women enjoying themselves.

I grabbed a sandwich and found some shade at a nearby picnic table, pulling out my laptop to do a little work. This was a definite perk to my job, being able to work anywhere. I was just finishing invoicing a client when the tinkle of laughter caught my attention.

I looked up to see a small child—a little girl in a yellow sundress—being tossed into the air by her father. They were both laughing, the little girl squealing in delight. An older girl stood nearby. She couldn’t have been over ten years old, holding an ice cream cone in each hand. Their dad, a young, handsome man, secured the little girl on his hip and took the cone the older girl offered. He passed the cone to the girl in his arms, then reached back to clasp the older girl’s hand. All three connected, smiling, enjoying a sunny summer day in June.

Memories flooded me of another time, and another little girl. Me.

Homesickness washed over me again, this time going beyond the friends I’d left behind. I had once been that blonde, curly-headed child with one man in her world. The most fun-loving man that had ever lived. He pulled her close and spun her around, shared his ice cream, held her hand, and made her feel like a princess.

My dad had been my world as a young girl.

Then came the divorce.

Then the accident that changed everything.

The day my dad had his crash, I’d been waiting on him to pick me up to go on an adventure. He never came. In my misguided young mind, I felt abandoned, like he chose his travel and adventure over me.

Years of anger and resentment had fooled me into thinking that it was his fault. That his own decisions took him away from me. That he chose to leave Mom and me behind. That he chose to replace us with a new wife. That his adventures eventually led to him taking a risk that changed all our lives.

Despite being a child at the time, I’d not been innocent. I had chosen to stay away, deciding that it was too hard to see him after his accident. I couldn’t bear to be reminded of all that he was and would never be again. And I’d stayed away. For far too long.

I was a selfish, misguided asshole.

And I was missing the relationship, both with him and my stepmom. It’d taken me losing everything to realize that the most important things in life weren’t really things.

The most important things in life were the people in it.

Suddenly, I knew what I needed to do. I needed to see him and make right all the ways I’d abandoned him.

Chapter 12

Jordan

I white-knuckled the steering wheel as I pulled Pearl into the convalescent center parking lot. I was up near Martha’s Vineyard, and the travel to get there had been a slog. But the places to stop and explore along the way had been amazing.

I sat staring at the building, gathering my courage to go inside. From the outside, you’d never know what went on behind those walls. Hell, I wasn’t even sure what went on inside. Not like I had ever set foot in there. And he’d been at this center for several years.

It had always been easier to just avoid the situation. To stay away and pretend like my life hadn’t ended the day my stepmom called me to tell me that Dad had been in a plane crash that killed the pilot and had left my dad with a brain injury.

Seeing my beloved daddy in a coma was the hardest thing I’d ever been through, and my teenage brain couldn’t comprehend the emotions I was feeling, so I’d pushed them down. Ten years later and I was still disassociating, still ignoring the hard emotions as a twenty-six-year-old.

Keeping in touch with my stepmom, Sandi, via email had been easier than actually talking to her on the phone. Using my mom and grandma as a buffer for information became the norm, until I just stopped reading and responding. Eventually, Sandi quit including me.

I hated that I’d missed so much. Just willfully ignored it for years.

I had no idea what I would find when I went in the building. No idea if they’d even let me see him. No idea where Sandi was, or if she would even want to hear from me or let me see my dad.

The words “brain injury,” “induced coma,” and “paralyzed” all rambled around in the recesses of my mind as I walked to the front doors of the convalescent and rehabilitation center. Wiping my palms on my jeans before opening the door, I entered a brightly lit lobby. Green plants lined the full wall of windows, light brown loveseats sat in clusters around small magazine-filled tables.

Gathering my courage, I made my way to the reception desk, where a young woman greeted me with a smile.

“Hello, how can I help you today?”

I clutched my purse to my stomach. “I’m not sure if I’m on his visitor list, but I’m hoping to visit Waylon Ashley.”

“Oh, Mr. Waylon is such a sweetie. He’s in room 202.” She clicked around on her computer and beamed at me. “But right now, he should be in the gardens for some outdoor time. Do you need directions on how to find him?”

Armed with a highlighted map, I set off to find the man I hadn’t seen in years.

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