Page 75 of Almost True
Unfortunately, as I was walking back, I got her response.
“I miss you too. I think it’s best if we don’t message as much. It’s too hard.”
I swallowed against the rocks in my throat and responded immediately.“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to make anything hard for you.”
Thankfully, or maybe not, she responded just as fast.“You’re wonderful. Never apologize. I wish I was stronger. Take care.”
I stared at the phone, wondering whether there was anything I could say to that. Her words felt final, like a door shutting.
Pain arced through me. It’d come in waves the last few days, mostly sneaking in when I finally let myself think about how much I missed her. Otherwise, since it’d only been a few days, I could pretend she was still here and we were both just busy. But this did it. Door closed, locked.
“Aid, good. Let’s go ahead and start,” Rich said as he stomped along the path between his house and the office.
I exhaled slowly in an attempt to get a grip on the moment and not drown in the wash of disappointment, regret, and hurt brimming in me. “Sure. Yeah. Let’s do it.”
It was fitting, this timing. Telling Rich the truth after years and years of avoiding it—breaking his heart in the wake of breaking my own—how perfectly awful.
He filled a mug of coffee from the carafe that’d been sitting onwarmfor hours, since I’d started it this morning, then took a seat at the round, six-person table. One leg was shorter than the others and had wobbled since the first time I’d come in nearly two decades ago on my first visit.
“So, what’s on your mind?” He sipped from the mug.
I cleared my throat, reminding myself of all the reasons I wasn’t going to shy away from the truth this time.This time, I would say the words I’d shoved down in order to avoid hurting him. This time, I would allow myself this honesty, for both our sakes.
“I understand you’ve been hesitant about selling the farm.”
He nodded, slow and deliberate. “Yes, I sure have.”
Willing him to say more—perhaps the part he’d been avoiding telling me for all these years—I waited. But he’d come prepared to listen, and ultimately, I didn’t need him to say anything. This was my show.
“I need you to know that I feel strongly you should sell. And in case there’s a part of you that wonders if I’d like to buy it, I have to tell you, I can’t.”
His brow furrowed and he pressed his lips into a familiar frown. “I wouldn’t have asked you to buy it, Aidan. I wanted to give it to you. You and Luca.”
My heart squeezed. It was more than I’d imagined. It made me want to hug him and shake him. Even so, I sifted through all the tangled thoughts to find the right one first. “Thank you. Truly, Rich, that’s so generous and thoughtful. But I can’t do that.”
He waved me away. “Of course you can. You know more about the business than I do by now. You’re managing it beautifully, and Luca has practically grown up here.”
I nodded. “Yes. That’s true. But I’ve got my own business. I’m sorry to say it, but I’ve lost sight of that. I should’ve said something years ago, but I didn’t want to hurt anyone.”
His frown deepened and he was quiet for a moment. As a patently contemplative person, his silence didn’t surprise me, but my stomach had tied into knots. And before he could speak again, I rushed to explain myself, hoping I hadn’t upset him too deeply.
“I wish I felt like this was where I was meant to be. I’m sorry. I know I should’ve spoken up sooner, but you’ve had so much pain to deal with, and I didn’t want to cause you any more by disappointing you or… failing you.” The words were out now, floating between us, little shards of glass raining down all around the worn-out table.
He reached for me and patted my hand. “Oh, son. You couldn’t disappoint us.”
I swallowed hard.
He continued. “I know you’ve got your own dreams, but don’t you think you might shift it, just a little, to include the farm? I know how you love the trees. You and Viv have so many good memories there.”
Low blow.But I respected him using all his resources. And I hoped he’d respect me using all of mine. I pulled out a document with a bright green plastic cover and slid it across the table.
He eyed it with a flicker of wariness and what I knew had to be pain, opening it with just his thumb and index fingers. Viv had always loved a colorful presentation. “What’s this here?”
“Viv was going to give this to you. She was working up some other plans to go with it—ideas for what’d come next. But this was the start.” My heart practically fluttered, it pounded so fast. Here was overkill for my point, a kind of weapon I hadn’t entirely planned on using. Though, perhaps to my shame, obviously I’d had it ready.
He thumbed through the pages, frown drawing down all the more before he tripped his chin up, his eyes following a few seconds later. “She thought we should sell. Even then?”
I nodded, gritting my teeth at the surprise laced with pain.
