Page 191 of Contempt

I’ve never been on Hayden’s boat before, and it takes until we’re boarding hand-in-hand and Landon is dragging behind a bit for me to realize this is the boat he took out with his mother that day that she didn’t come back.

I slow down, letting Mom and Hayden get ahead of us so I can have a moment of privacy with him. “Are you okay?”

He nods. “Yeah.”

“You sure?”

He nods again, but I can tell his jaw is locked tight.

I know he must be having some weird memories, so I drop his hand and slide an arm around his waist instead, giving him a little sideways hug as we board the boat.

Hayden takes Mom to see the captain. We follow, but not as close behind so we can keep talking.

“I’m surprised he wanted to do this on the boat,” I murmur. “Was that the last time you were on it?”

Landon nods. “He asked me first. That’s how I knew what we were getting ready for.”

“Still.”

“I get it,” Landon says. “He’s always loved the water. Like you,” he says lightly. Then, he goes on. “I used to love the water, too, but it’s hard to keep loving something that took so much from you.”

My heart swells up with sympathy. As soon as we reach the level Mom and Hayden are on, I turn and give him a hug. “I’m sorry.”

He caresses the back of my hair. “I know.”

I lean back so I can look up at him, but I remain in his embrace. “Can I ask you a question?”

“Of course.”

“Why the swim team? It seems like that’s the worst possible club for you to be a part of.”

He shrugs, still with his arms secured around me, then he looks out at the water almost rebelliously. “I’ve been swimming since I was practically a baby. I’m a strong-ass fucking swimmer. Ishouldhave been able to find her, to grab her, to pull her back to the surface before it was too late.”

My heart lodges itself in my throat, and I remember what he said to me when I gave him the muffins. When he asked if they were good enough to make him forget his mom was dead and it was all his fault.

“It wasn’t your fault, Landon. You were just a kid.”

“I know.” He nods. “But I should have been strong enough to keep my family together. I never wanted to look at the fucking water again after we lost her. I switched bedrooms because I couldn’t stand to look at the ocean every day. Didn’t even bother making the new one my own, I just… lived there like a visitor looking forward to the day I could finally leave.” His gaze drifts to me. “Until you moved in.”

Surprise causes the question to slip out. “Am I in your old room?”

He nods, then looks out at the ocean. His jaw locks, his green eyes stormy and irritable, like he’s regarding an enemy instead of a body of water. “But after the initial grief passed, when my dad disappeared on me, and… it was like I’d lost both of them.” He looks down. “I had to know if I ever found myself in a position like that again, I’d be prepared. I had to be stronger. I needed to be the strongest fucking swimmer that had ever lived. I needed to be able to hold on to what mattered to me and not let it slip away.”

It breaks my heart hearing that.

I knew Landon changed after his mom’s death. He wasn’t like this before, angry and pugilistic and controlling. He was mischievous, but he never had a chip on his shoulder. He was one of the popular kids at school, amusing and handsome and athletic. He was well-liked and friends with everybody. The whole world was his playground so he had no reason to hate it, but then, in the space of one afternoon, his whole world changed. Darkened.

He lost so much.

He was never the same after that.

I suppose I wouldn’t be, either.

He was only twelve, but even losing my mother now, when I’m basically an adult, would emotionally cripple me. I don’t know how you recover from a loss like that.

I don’t think Landon ever has.

And it’s impossible not to notice how he applied all the new mental processes he adopted to me.

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