Page 163 of Catch the Sun

I don’t know what comes next, but it has to be something. Healing only comes with a forward trajectory.

My head snaps up when I hear footsteps approaching. Branches cracking, leaves rustling. A moment later, Max appears, towering in the entryway of our secret hiding spot in navy running shorts and a light-gray tee, his eyes glittering in the fading daylight.

I’m already close to tears. I’m not sure how I’m going to get through this.

But I’m here.

I’m ready.

He steps inside, his throat rolling as he swallows. “Hey, Sunny.”

The nickname almost breaks me in two. My bottom lip quivers so I stab it with my teeth. “Hey.” I watch as he lingers for a moment, eyes on me, hair tinted with pink and orange. I scoot over on the bench, leaving space for a second person to sit beside me. If that person wants to. “I was surprised to hear from you,” I confess.

He nods slowly, eyeing the vacant space on the bench as he takes another step forward, all the way into the clearing. “Sorry I’ve been distant. My dad’s diagnosis came in right after everything happened with…” He swallows, stalls his feet. “It’s called Lewy body dementia. There’s no cure. I’m trying to figure out what to do, how to help him. There are treatment plans available, facilities that can care for him, but…I don’t know. I’ll need to figure out a way to collect an income. Chevy offered to bring me in on a house flip he’s working on outside of town. Maybe I can do that.”

I stare at him, dumbfounded. Heartbroken.

“God…Max,” I murmur. “I’m so sorry.”

“It is what it is. I’ll figure it out.” Shrugging, he gazes back at me, trying to hold it together. “I remember building that bench with Dad,” he whispers, changing the subject. “We started it that same night. After you left the park.”

I blink back tears. “Really?”

“Yeah. It was before Dad’s accident. Before Mom left, before you left.” He swallows, his jaw tight. “I think…I think that was my last really good day. Until you came back to Juniper Falls and stole my heart for a second time.”

My brows wrinkle, a rock lodging my throat.

Max shakes his head. “No…that’s not true. You never gave it back in the first place.”

I dip my chin, the rock becoming a boulder. “We had one magical year together when we were kids. We were so young.”

“It’s really something, isn’t it?”

“What?” I breathe out, lifting my head.

“Innocence.” His gaze retreats from mine momentarily before floating back. “It’s so fleeting, right? But,God—it’s life-changing. Gone in a blink but powerful enough to shape every moment after. Every love story, every dream. We can’t get it back once it’s left, but we hold on to everything it gave us at the time,” he says, emotion fusing each word. “I never let go of you, Ella. I thought I was an entirely different person when you returned, but I wasn’t. Seeing you again felt like coming home.” Max takes another step forward and drops to his knees in front of me, taking my hands in his. “Young love…”

I finish for him, tears traveling down my cheeks. “The purest fucking kind.”

A smile stretches through the melancholy as he dusts his thumbs over my knuckles.

I glance over his head and out through the clearing opening. The sky grays before my eyes, the wind picking up like an omen. A sharp stab to innocence.

Color drains from the sky and thunder crackles in the distance.

Gunshots tears holes in sweet reveries.

Everything slams back into me, reminding me of all the things I long to forget. But there’s no forgetting.

Letting go of Max’s hands, I stand from the bench and move around him, staring out at the lake as the water ripples and churns. I fold my arms with a shiver. “I don’t know how to move forward from this,” I admit, my words aimed at the sky, at the lake, at him. “I don’t know how to heal. Where does healing come from, anyway? Time? Therapy? Long walks and longer talks?” I shrug, feeling hopeless. “None of that feels like healing. It just feels like forcing happiness back into your life after it was ripped away from you.”

“What other choice do we have?”

“I don’t know. I don’t think all the books or advice in the world can put our pieces back together.” When he doesn’t respond, I walk ahead, out into the woods. Warm wind sweeps my hair up as the treetops undulate overhead. “With every ounce of healing comes another hard blow. One step forward, two steps back. Maybe some people aren’t meant to heal or overcome.”

I feel him come up behind me as a few wayward raindrops slip from the clouds.

“Sunny,” he whispers to my back.

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