Page 289 of The Fall
Six months after my surgery,Dr. Lin finally clears me for light skating. No contact, no teammates, no pucks, but it’s enough. The empty rink gives me space to rediscover the rhythm of my edges cutting through fresh ice and the burn returning to my quads as I work through basic drills.
I roll my shoulders as I unlock our front door, savoring the satisfying ache in my muscles that have been too long idle. The doctors all say I’m healing well, and the word “miracle” has been thrown around more than once.
Our house is quiet when I step inside, but a flash of red catches my eye.
A single red rose lies on the floor of the foyer, and beside it, a length of velvet ribbon lies loosely on the floor, puddling down the hall and toward the kitchen. Blair’s handwriting curves across a small card tied to the stem:Follow me.
I follow the ribbon to the kitchen counter, where a ticket is anchored by a small river stone. It’s from my first game I played with the Mutineers, and Blair’s handwriting fills another small card beside it:I thought you were going to be trouble. I was right, but not how I expected.
Another ribbon leads me further, to a vial of white sand.From our island, where you taught me to breathe again, and I finally understood what people meant when they talk about fate.
More ribbon tugs me forward, leading me through our house and pulling me into the story of us. I’m on a treasure hunt through our history.
An orange Nerf dart and half of a pink cast are next.This is when I knew your heart was as beautiful as everything else about you.
Then, a splinter of composite stick mounted in a shadow box. It takes me a moment to recognize that it’s from my broken hockey stick, the one Blair mounted on the locker room wall.You never give up. Not on yourself. Not on the game. Not on the people you love. Your determination became my inspiration.
There’s a bottle of Glacier Cherry Gatorade beside another note:Loving someone means knowing what they need before they ask.I’ve made sure every trainer, every equipment manager, every arena we go to has it stocked.
Near our bedroom door is a torn jersey stained with blood. It’s Blair’s, and I don’t understand until I read the note:I will always fight for you. And for us.
The ribbon leads me into our bedroom, where my hospital bracelet rests on my pillow.You came back to me twice. Once from a future that couldn’t hold us, once from the edge of leaving me behind. We have faced the worst together and we survived. You are the bravest person I’ve ever known.
It flows down to the floor and up our dresser, then drapes around the lava lamp I bought him, the wax bubbling in lazy spirals.You found light in me when I thought there was only darkness left.
Finally, a folded piece of sketch paper lies against the glass door to the lanai. I open it, and?—
It’s my own drawing of Blair, the one he discovered me working on during that flight back from Dallas.
You draw me the way I hope to be, not just the way I am. I hope I can live up to the man you see.
The ribbon continues through the sliding door and out onto the lanai. I follow it, pulling the velvet into my hands, walking out into the sunlight beside the water. And there, at the end of the ribbon, is Blair.
He’s wearing a simple button-down and khaki shorts, and he’s barefoot on the dock. He’s holding another red rose. “You found me,” he says.
I hold up the ribbon’s end. “Blair…”
“I had this whole speech planned,” he says. “About time and second chances and how some people search their whole lives for what we have.” He reaches into his pocket.
“But the truth is simple.” Blair opens his palm, holding out a platinum band inlaid with a thin line of blue diamonds that catch the light like waves. “I love you, Torey Kendrick. I want every day with you: the good ones, the hard ones, all of them.” His voice breaks as he falls to one knee. “Will you marry me?”
“Yes,” I say. “Yes, Blair. Yes.” My words spill from me in a rush, my voice breaking on each because one “yes” is never enough. I pull him up; I need him standing, need him close, need his heartbeat against mine. “Yes,” I whisper again against his lips. When he kisses me, I taste the salt of tears, mine or his, I’m not sure.
I rest my forehead against his when we break apart, breathing him in. His hand shakes as he takes mine and slides the ring onto my finger.
“Perfect fit,” he whispers.
The band carries the heat of his skin. It catches the afternoon light, blue stones shimmering, a reflection of captured water orthe shine of his eyes, the ocean transformed into a treasure, a victory we’ve conquered together.
“I bought it before…” His voice catches. “I thought about this every day in the hospital, and every day since.”
I cup his jaw, feel the prickle of his stubble under my palm, the tremor he can’t quite hide. He leans into my touch, our foreheads fitting together. The thin, blue line flashes—ocean, sky, and a future he carried for us. “We made it,” I whisper. “Through different storms.”
A breeze lifts the end of the velvet, and it brushes against my ankle. It trails from my fist to our bare feet, pooling in soft curves along the dock boards, the story of us unfurling to its last page. We stand together on the edge of land and sea, two people who came together across time, across pain, across all the barriers that should have kept us apart.
Time brings us where we’re meant to be, and I’m exactly where I belong.
Sixty-Two
