Page 85 of Just Say When

“I think you’re chickenshit.”

“Well, I’d say that’s about right.” I went back to shoveling.

“She loves you.” Adam spoke quietly. Carefully. “You know that, right?”

I paused.DidI know that? Was it even true? She hadn’t said she loved me.Maybe it’s realwas nice to hear, but it wasn’t the same as love. Shehadloved me, once. Even if she hadn’t fully recognized it then for what it was. I had wrecked that up good.

I wasstillwrecking things now.

“You remember how close Essie and I were in high school?” I asked. “And then one day we weren’t.”

Adam straightened and his gaze sharpened. “I remember.”

“Essie and I went hiking. We weren’t supposed to. We cut school, even though I promised Jack we wouldn’t. She wasn’t dressed for it. Fucking sneakers with no traction. Iwarnedher.” I shook my head. Hubris. “She was fine. I was the one who screwed up. I was walking backward like an idiot. Not paying attention. Istepped in a sketchy area, too close to the cliff. The ground crumbled beneath me.”

Adam didn’t move. Didn’t speak. Just listened.

I swallowed hard. “I should have died. Should have fallen to my death and gotten one of those posthumous Darwin Awards. But she grabbed me and yanked me back. She grabbed me so hard that the momentum of it sent her over. She went over the fucking cliff, Adam.” My voice cracked. All these years later, I could still feel that moment like I was still right there, screaming her name.

“It was my fault,” I said. “My fault she fell. I knew better than to break a rule, but I did it anyway, and that’s what happened.”

Adam was quiet, watching me.

I looked at him, waiting for his condemnation.

“And then?” he asked.

I frowned. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, Essie isn’t dead. I just saw her this morning. And you’re not dead, either. So finish the story.”

I barked a laugh. “She survived. She wasn’t even really hurt. She didn’t fall that far before her foot caught on a boulder. The cliff was mostly scree, so it was slippery, but she crawled her ass right back up the cliff. I realized then that it didn’t matter that we were only sixteen. I loved her, she loved me, and it wasn’t the kind of thing that would end when we graduated. But Essie had plans. Big dreams. I couldn’t stand in the way ofthat. And if I had tried, Jack would have tossed me right over that cliff anyway.”

Adam snorted at that, but he didn’t disagree. He knew Jack.

“I told him I wouldn’t hold her back. I promised him I wouldn’t give her a reason to stay. That’s why we stopped being friends. I couldn’t be around her without telling her how I felt, and if I did that, she wouldn’t have wanted to leave Aspen Springs.” I leaned on my pitchfork. “Fuck.”

“That wasn’t the end, either, because now you’re married,” Adam said. “Finish the story.”

“You know that story. The story is, I fucked up again.” I wanted to kick something, but instead I shoveled another forkful of manure into the wheelbarrow.

“That’s just where you are now. The story isn’t over yet. You keep getting hung up on all the crappy parts. The imperfect parts. And I get it, because I getyou, and you’ve always been like this as long as I’ve known you. So damn good, it’s annoying. But everyone messes up sometimes, and you have a damn hard time coming to terms with that for yourself.”

I shrugged. I knew that was true, and there was no sense in denying it. Nothing hadmademe this way. It was simply who I was. It didn’t matter that I could forgive mistakes in others. I could never forgive them in myself.

“You’re still alive, Brax,” Adam said. “Essie is stillalive. And the two of you love each other so damn much, it’s kind of gross to look at, honestly.”

I choked out a laugh. It sure as fuck wasn’t a sob.

My brother had the decency to look away, give me some privacy. “I thought my story was done. James made me realize how ridiculous that was. I learned the hard way that your story, whatever it might be, doesn’t end until you draw your last breath. Even my first marriage…I thought I knew that story, but it wasn’t until years after Emily died that I understood the full truth of it. Your story changes you, but it also changeswithyou.”

Adam pulled off his work gloves and squeezed my shoulder. “I’m sorry you had to watch Essie go over a cliff. That’s an awful thing to have witnessed, and I can only imagine how you felt when you didn’t know if she was going to live or die. But don’t get stuck there, in that memory. It wasn’t the end.Thisisn’t the end. You have fuckingdecadesleft to finish the story. So what are you going to do?”

34

Essie

Istared at the dropped pin, and the text message attached to it.

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