Page 93 of Holding Out

“Hey,” he said.“How’d it go?”

“I feel like—” Griff looked to the ceiling.“I feel like I’ve been wrung out and run over.”

“It gets easier.”

“Does it?Doesn’t feel like it’ll ever get easier.”

“The more times you tell the story, the less power it has over you.”

Through his exhaustion, he could feel the truth of that.He’d relayed the events to Becca, the stranger in Home Depot and CJ, Jake, and now the men of the support group, and each time, he’d felt a tiny bit of grace trickle into the dark space of his guilt and remorse.He could imagine that someday, there would be enough light for him to see clearly.Someday, he wouldn’t hate himself when he thought of that night.

Someday.

Jake eyed him sympathetically.“Hey, man.I’ve been meaning to say.I’m sorry about Becca.”

The sound of her name made his heart feel twice as heavy in his chest.He shook his head.“Not half as sorry as I am.”

“Have you tried talking to her?”

“There’s nothing to talk about.”

“You sure about that?”

“Pretty sure we both said everything there was to say.”

It was Jake’s turn to shake his head.“You know you’re making me lose to Mira for the third time, right?Can’t you take pity on me?”

“If I could fix this, I would.I tried.”

Jake tilted his head.“I was listening just now when you were leading the group, you know.You did good.And that’s how it was for me, too.Feeling like I never deserved to be happy, after what I’d let happen.It’s a dangerous feeling.It can keep taking and taking from you, if you let it.Don’t let it.”

Griff just stared at him.He knew Jake meant well, but he couldn’t absorb any more right now.His whole body felt bruised.His soul, too, if he believed there was such a thing.Whatever part of him Jake’s words had just poked at, anyway.

“Enough touchy-feely shit for one day, huh?”Jake laughed.“I get it.Well, let me know if I can help.Not because I’m your friend or anything.Just because I want to win a fucking bet with Mira someday.”

“Thanks.I think.”

Jake put his fist out for a bump, and Griff left feeling just as hungover and miserable as when he’d come in.

He went out to the archery range and shot until his arm muscles trembled and his fingers felt raw where the strings dug in.

He’d come to the range to distract himself, but it wasn’t working.He kept thinking of the day of the picnic.The feel of Becca in his arms, the tease of their words, the promise that had simmered in the air.

Usually, archery made him feel better.It was something he could control.It was simple, forceful, and precise.

But today, it just made him remember how off the mark he was, and what he’d lost.

45

She sat behind the reception desk at Wallingford Wellness and chatted amiably with a parade of beautiful women who had come into the spa to get more beautiful.To become their best selves, which, to them, was something they could buy.She envied them their conviction that it was possible.

And she didn’t begrudge them their happiness, not at all.She didn’t resent how blissed-out and relaxed all the spa’s patrons looked as they ambled out the door, having put aside their to-dos for an afternoon.She just didn’t feel very much of anything else, either.

She kept hoping against hope that some shaggy vet would walk through the door, seeking the massage that would give him the first relief from pain he’d had in days or weeks or years.

“I think we should give a veteran discount,” she told Wendy one day, a week into the job.

“Aveterandiscount?”

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