Page 65 of The Oath We Give

Dropping pieces of her laugh, leaving them behind. Forgetting the smell of her perfume, losing the sound of her voice in my ear.

It doesn’t hurt, and sometimes I wish it did.

With pain comes remembrance. The throb and ache of loss is a constant reminder of the person who no longer exists. When you hurt, you remember everything so clearly because the pain forces you to.

When you stop hurting, you forget.

The wound slowly stops oozing, skin pulling together and creating a scar. One that sometimes itches or pricks, reminding you it’s there, but in the day to day, you barely know it’s there.

Rosemary Donahue deserved someone who would hurt for her for lifetimes.

Two years ago, just before the boys and I parted ways, I stood in front of this very grave and made her a promise. I swore I’d leave Stephen in the past, letting him wither away in a jail cell to pay for his sins.

It’s because of him I have to break yet another promise to the girl lying six feet below.

“I told you was letting it go, what Stephen did. I promised I’d do better, be better the next time I showed up.” My throat burns with quiet rage, fury I’ve held beneath the surface too well. “But this isn’t revenge, Rose. It’s for the boys, for Sage. Their futures. It’s him or us this time.”

It isn’t revenge for me this time. It’s my turn to live on the opposite end of the coin. I’m trying to protect the ones I love while a man tries to get back at us for the life we stole from him.

I hope she knows everything I’m doing from this point forward is not with a vengeful heart.

Slowly, I move so that I sit against the back of her tombstone. Resting my spine on the stone, I tilt my head up to gaze at the sky. When Rosie and I were in middle school, we’d sit back to back and look up. I’d listen while she made up stories about all the bunnies in the clouds.

It’s often forgotten that we weren’t just in a relationship. When she died, I lost my friend.

Rose and I, we experienced a life-altering trauma that no one but us believed. We had faith in each other’s words because we’d gone through it together. That event had bonded us.

So here, when I come to visit now, I tell her about the good. I talk about Alistair getting married, knowing it would send her over the fucking moon to know the angry man she’d called the “big brother” had finally let someone love him. Even though he’d hate it, I tell her about Thatcher, about Lyra, who I think she would be best friends with. I make sure she knows I’m looking out for Sage, even though Rook is doing a pretty good job all on his own.

I let her know we are okay, that regardless of the blackmail hanging over our heads, the possibility of us going to jail if it’s released, we are alright. That we did okay without her.

I tell her the bad.

That the possibility of her seeing my dad is coming sooner than I’d ever thought. Which leads me into talking about work and Stephen, eventually getting to the part of my white lie of having a girlfriend. She’d laugh if she were here—she would laugh at me for panicking.

I spill out my guts to a tombstone that has no choice but to listen, and I hope the girl I once knew hears me.

“Mom will kill me if she finds out I’m lying. I just can’t let Dad die knowing his entire life’s work is being sold. After everything they tried to do for me, Rose, I can’t let it happen.” I swallow the lump of frustration in my throat, letting out a sigh as I slide my palm down my cheek. “And Coraline, she’s…”

Coraline is what?

Stubborn. Strong-willed. Too fucking hardheaded. A girl I have a strong desire to kiss every time she’s in the room?

In the silence of this graveyard, I let myself smirk as I shake my head a little.

“Coraline is…Coraline. I don’t know a lot about her other than she’s an artist, and Rook likes her, which isn’t surprising—he’s a fan of anyone who gives Thatcher shit.”

Did I want to shoot Thatch in the foot for how he talked to her? I had the urge, yes.

Did I also enjoy watching her chew him up and spit him out all on her own? Absolutely.

She puts on a brave face, but she’s one moment away from shattering to pieces. When we are alone, I see it. I feel it.

I saw it in my kitchen the other night. Saw it when she fell asleep on my couch, curled in a ball, protecting herself even when she’s unconscious.

Stephen hurt her. There is no one who will ever know what happened in that basement besides her and him. She’s so afraid of being seen as a victim that she won’t let herself heal.

I know what it’s like to feel that trauma, a living, breathing wound. To be attached to anger, the need for revenge. But for Coraline, it’s like her past has consumed her. It’s made her hard, unapproachable, and it drives me insane ’causeI know that’s not who she is. She shows glimpses of it but never the full truth.

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