Page 55 of The Lies We Told Ourselves

“Whoa, whoa, back up a bit. I’m still digesting this.”

Xander glanced at me out of the side of his eye and then made his way over to where the hay bales were stacked in the corner before dropping onto one. “There’s nothing to digest, Book. It’s a done deal. I took the deal, and they bought me out ten months ago.”

“Ten months?”

“Yeah. I may have sat and wallowed for a while after.”

I took a seat on the hay next to him, trying to think about what to say next. Xander had worked so hard to get to where he was. It was practically unheard of for someone at his age. I had a feeling that our parents had a hand in it, but if they did, they never told him or anyone else. Which was most definitely unlike them.

I couldn’t see how he could be so laid back about this whole thing, but I guess he’d had a lot longer to come to terms with it.

“So what’s the plan now?” I asked.

“Finish up my treatment and then figure out how to salvage my career.”

“You’re in treatment then.”

“Working the steps. Got a sponsor and everything. He keeps telling me I can go back to work, but I just…I don’t know. I need some time. I want to get a year under my belt. I want to prove that I can do it. Not to mention that I’ve got absolutely no clue what to do next.”

“Doc Matthews closed up the practice in town,” I told him. “Willowbrook is crying out for a primary care physician.”

“Yeah, because running back to the root of all my problems is just what I need right now.”

He wasn’t wrong. Our parents were the root of most of our problems. It was the curse of the Farrington family that our mother could never accept. In her eyes, she could never be the problem. Regina Farrington existed in a world of absolute superiority over those around her. It couldn’t last though, and I was sitting back, waiting to watch the fallout. As long as it didn’t hurt any of my brothers, it would be the best damn time of my life.

“I wondered why you were back in town.”

“Trace told me about Cade, and I wanted to meet him. Plus, we all need to talk about Gage. We’re bringing him home, right?” Xander looked around the barn and sighed. “Not that ‘home’ is really where any of us want to be.”

I knew what he meant. Our parents’ house had never really been a home. We’d all gotten out of there as fast as we could and never looked back. Maybe dragging Gage back to all this was cruel. He was free of it all. Living life the way he wanted. Wasn’t that what we’d all dreamed of back then?

“I don’t know about bringing him back. That’s a choice for him. But he needs to know that we know the truth now, and it shouldn’t be something that keeps him away. Reece has tried to get in contact with him through his social media accounts, so I guess we’ll see if he bites.”

Xander looked at me in question. “Reece?”

“She did some social media job before all this. I don’t know anything about that stuff. Besides, he’s more likely to respond to a beautiful woman than any of us,” I said, waving my hand around.

“You’re not wrong there.”

Xander sighed and leaned back. Val put her head on his lap, and he absently played with her ears while he thought. I didn’t think I’d ever done this before. Just sat in silence with Xander and existed in the same place without any kind of expectation.

“I’m sorry,” I finally said, breaking through the silence. “I should have been there more for you when we were growing up.”

He shrugged. “It is what it is, Book. None of us had it any easier than the rest. We’re lucky that Gramps gave us the means to do whatever we wanted and get the hell out of that place. There are a lot of kids worse off than we were.”

He was right, but it didn’t make me feel any better. It didn’t make the situation any easier.

I wanted to be the guy that had moved past all this. The one who didn’t let the past affect his present so much, but how was that ever going to be possible when they still lived so close by? When heading into town came with the constant risk of seeing my mother around every corner.

My grandfather had saved me for a brief moment when he’d left me the ranch, but he also chained me to this town and my parents in a way I’d never realized before. I could never leave the ranch. I could never leave the potential of everything I was building here. It could do so much good for so many lives.

And because of that, I now saw that I’d never truly be free.

I couldn’t bring Gage back into this. He shouldn’t have to live his life surrounded by his biggest regret. The kindest thing was to let him keep having the life we all wished we could have had as well.

“How has it been so many years and it still feels like such a mess?” I mused.

Val lifted her head from Xander’s lap and looked at me, a soft whine escaping her until I laid my hand on her back.

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