“Do you resent it?” Wren asked gently. “That he retired and left you without a partner? That he moved on?”
Exandra was quiet for a long moment. Fred quacked softly, almost questioningly.
“I did at first,” she admitted. “When Bayard gave notice so soon after Zeph left it was like... like everyone was leaving. Even the younger agents I’d trained were moving into leadership or starting families or finding lives outside the Society. And I was still there, the old war horse who didn’t know when to quit.”
“But you’re not old,” Wren protested.
“I’m one hundred and eight years old, dear. That’s old by any measure.” Exandra smiled wryly. “And I’m the last one left from my cohort. Everyone else found something else. Someone else. And I just keep...” She trailed off.
“Why?” Wren asked. “What’s holding you there?”
The question hung in the air. Fred quacked again, more insistently this time, as if demanding an answer, too.
“I don’t know how to do anything else. How tobeanyone else.” Exandra said. “I don’t know who I am without the work. And I...” She swallowed hard. “I don’t know if I deserve to find out.”
“Why wouldn’t you deserve it?”
“Because I’ve made mistakes. Terrible mistakes that hurt people. I—” She paused. “There are certain things I can’t undo. Choices I can’t take back. Maybe this is my penance. Maybe I’m meant to keep working until there’s nothing left.”
“That’s not a life,” Wren argued. “That’s a prison sentence.”
Fred quacked emphatically, and Exandra looked down at him.
“Don’t start with me, Freddie,” she said, but her voice was soft.
“He disagrees with you,” Wren observed.
“He’s biased. He thinks everyone deserves happiness.”
Wren thought of Jasper, of the camera ornament she’d seen him sneak into his pocket. Was it meant for her? Would he have the courage to give it to her? She hoped so.
“Maybe he’s right,” Wren said.
Exandra shook her head. “You don’t understand. When you’ve hurt someone….”
“Why not try riding off into the sunset anyway?” Wren posited. “I mean, what’s the worst that could happen? You’ve got nothing to lose if you’re already unhappy. You don’t seem like a bad person to me. And you certainly don’t seem like a coward.”
Exandra frowned at her, and Wren hoped she wasn’t overstepping. But one of the things she’d learned as a journalist was to ask the hard questions, and speak the truth, even when it scared you to do so. Of all the regrets people shared with her in their interviews, letting fear dictate their actions was the biggest one. Better to take the risk than to die withwhat ifs.
“Can I tell you something?” Wren said. “It’s not anything to do with the article. Just an observation... person to person?”
Exandra looked up, surprised by the younger woman’s boldness. “All right.”
“I’m twenty-six years old. I’ve been a travel writer for four years now. And every single day, I’m terrified I’m not good enough. That my writing isn’t special enough, my photographs aren’t artistic enough, that I’m just one mediocre person in a seaof mediocrity. That I don’t deserve the opportunities I’ve been given.”
“That’s not?—”
“Let me finish.” Wren leaned forward. “And now, suddenly there’s this boy. This kind, earnest, ridiculous boy who looks at me like I hung the moon. Who I think might have bought me a perfect gift I’m not even supposed to know about yet. He makes me laugh and sees me in ways no one else does. And I’ve sort of been holding him at arm’s length because it’s the ‘professional’ thing to do. But that’s not the real reason. The real reason is that I’m afraid. Afraid I’ll disappoint him. Afraid I’m not who he thinks I am. Afraid I don’t deserve that kind of love. So it just feels safer to be a little cynical.”
“That’s different?—”
“Is it?” Wren challenged. “You made a mistake at some point. So have I! Plenty of them. The person you hurt… Do you think they’d want you to punish yourself forever?”
Exandra’s pale eyes were extra bright with unshed tears. She glanced up at the ceiling and blinked a few times before answering Wren’s question. “I really don’t know.”
“I think you do, though,” Wren said gently. “And I think that’s what scares you most.”
Fred quacked once more, nodding his head decisively, and nuzzled himself under Exandra’s chin.
