Page 19 of The Life We Left Behind

I watched as her fingers drifted through the grass as she leaned back against the tree, staring out across the water. The light reflecting off the water lit her up with a soft glow. She looked so lost in her thoughts. Delaney loved this place so much. She said she felt close to her mother here because it was as close to heaven as she could get while she was still breathing. There had been times of the day when I’d felt it too. That golden hour as the sun was setting when everything just seemed to glow. The way it glistened on the water in the perfect silence of the pond.

I turned to look at the horizon, the sun already making its way into the sky for the morning. Maybe I should come back later, watch the sunset, and feel the magic just one more time. Perhaps that was how I’d find my center once again.

But then I turned back to our tree.

And she was still there.

Except she was different from how I remembered her.

Older.

Sadder.

My feet were moving before I even considered what I was doing. It had always been like this between us. Delaney was this impossible force of nature that drew me in until I begged for her to never let me go.

As I moved closer, I saw the tears that streaked her cheeks, and my breath stalled in my chest. Even in her sadness, she was more beautiful than I remembered. And just like always, everythought in my mind fled me, every crushing doubt and fear evaporated into nothing.

Because there was nothing in the world but her.

Delaney.

She turned to look at me as I stopped mere steps from her side. A part of me was afraid to say anything, like bursting the bubble of silence would see her fade away and slip through my fingers once more.

Her rosy lips parted in surprise, and so many emotions flowed through her eyes as she stared up at me. She didn’t move even a fraction of an inch as she locked eyes with me. Not to brush her beautiful auburn hair away from her face. Not even to wipe the tears from her cheeks. For a second, a flicker of pain crossed her features as she registered who it was that stood before her, and I hated that I was the one who had that effect on her.

“You came back,” I whispered.

I didn’t know why I said it, and that pain was there in her eyes again. I wanted to punch myself for how it must have sounded to her.

“My dad died.”

Her tears flowed quicker as the words tumbled from her lips, and she curled in on herself like the pain was more than she could bear. I moved to her side without a moment’s hesitation, dropping to the ground and gathering her up in my arms as I pulled her tight against me.

She stiffened for a second at my touch, but then as the sobs tore out of her, she clung to me, her arms circling my neck as she held on tight. And I clung to her just as fiercely. Holding together all the pieces of her as she let the grief consume her.

My lips fell to the top of her head, and I breathed her in as I rocked her gently in my arms. I didn’t deserve this. I didn’tdeserve her, but even the self-hatred coursing through my body couldn’t tear me away from her right now.

She was back.

She was in my arms.

And I’d not felt like I’d finally found my home since the last time I’d set eyes on her ten years ago.

After her tears had finally dried and her breathing had returned to normal, I didn’t let Delaney go. My mind was racing, trying to find any possible excuse to keep her in my arms.

Letting Delaney go the first time was the biggest mistake of my life, and even if that decision hadn’t haunted me out in the open all this time, it had lingered in my subconscious, reminding me of what could have been at every possible moment. I’d done so much wrong when it came to her, and I had no idea how I was going to fix it. If I even deserved a chance to fix it. All I knew was that I had to find some way to make it right. Even if I didn’t deserve that second chance with the one woman who had ever really occupied a piece of my heart, I was still going to try to have it.

This was it.

Shewas it.

The change I needed. The second chance I’d been looking for.

But it wouldn’t be easy to prove to her that I wasn’t the boy she’d left behind. That I was a different man now.

I felt the change in her as soon as she realized what we were doing and who she was doing it with. Her back straightened as every muscle in her body seemed to tense. Placing her hands on my chest, she gently pushed me away. I didn’t want to let her go. I needed any excuse to keep her where she was, but I knew that wasn’t the way. It wasn’t how I’d be able to persuade her to give me another chance.

“I can’t do this,” she muttered as she gently extracted herself from my arms.

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