Jack slants a look in my direction. “You didn’t tell me you were a masochist."
I let out a breathy laugh, wiping at the sweat gathering on my hairline. “It’s not so bad. C’mon.”
He follows behind me. The stairs creak beneath us, but I assure him they’re solid, even though I haven’t been up here in long enough to know that for certain. By the time we reach thetop, my thighs are burning and my breath is sharp in my chest. Jack is cursing beneath his breath, and I’m smothering smiles so he won’t see them.
But then we’re opening the hatch and letting ourselves in and we’re both struck silent by the view through the floor-to-ceiling paned windows. I’ve seen it more times that I can count, in every weather imaginable, but fall is my favorite. From here, you can see all the different colors on the trees—russet, crimson, bronze, copper, amber. The stunning blue of the river winding through the mountains. The hazy horizon typical of the Smokies. It’s an image I could paint by memory if I had the talent, one I can see imprinted on my eyelids when I close them and try to sleep. I know the world is big. Vast. And I’ve seen so very little of it. But still, I think this specific spot on earth will always be my favorite.
“This is…” Jack trails off, speechless.
“Worth it?” I ask, and his eyes connect with mine.
He nods.
I lower myself to the floor in one corner and lean against the windows. They’re shaking with the wind, and they’re cold against my sweating back. Jack does the same in the opposite corner, stretching his legs out. He knocks my boot with his.
“Thanks for bringing me here.”
I hold his gaze. His eyes are so blue, especially in the natural light pouring through the windows. There’s a smudge of green in one of them, a fleck of dark blue in the other. I wonder if he knows it, if anyone else has ever pointed it out, or if I’m the first to notice.
“Thanks for coming with me.”
His eyes flick to the view, and I watch as they dart around, taking it all in. “You bring people here for work?”
I shake my head. “No, we try to keep this place just for the locals.”
He looks at me. “You’re breaking the rules by bringing me here.”
My shoulder lifts in a shrug. “Making an exception.”
“I can see why you all would want to keep this place for yourselves.”
“It’s probably selfish of us.”
“I can’t imagine you being selfish.”
I turn from the view and let my gaze settle on his. “Why do you say that?”
“I saw how you were with your family today.” He’s quiet for a moment. “Seems like you do a lot for them.”
For some reason, the words don’t feel pointed the way they do when Wren says them. From him they just sound curious, like he really wants to understand our dynamic, like he wants to understandme.
“I was going to leave.” The words slip out and it’s a relief. I haven’t talked about it in so long, the dreams I had that never came true, the ones I put aside out of fury and responsibility. I don’t often regret it—I don’t really believe in having regrets—but there are times when I long for it so fiercely the ache feels physical.
“I was always going to leave Fontana Ridge,” I say. “Everyone knew it. But then the summer after my senior year, my dad hurt his back, and he had to have surgery. He couldn’t work on the farm for months, and things were already tight. I needed to stay to help out with his recovery and pick up the slack.”
Jack doesn’t say anything, only holds my gaze. His eyes are so soft right now it hurts to look at them, so I fix my gaze on the mountains again, the hazy smoke rolling through them.
“And then it just kept happening. It was always something. There was always some reason I needed to stay. And then…” I trail off. “I don’t know. At some point, staying became easier than leaving. All the things I wanted to do, the places I wantedto see, felt so far out of reach that even dreaming about them felt fanciful.
“So, I bought land. Then the Airstream, because even then, when I knew I wouldn’t ever have the courage to leave, I still couldn’t bring myself to build something permanent. And I stayed. I’ve always stayed.”
“How does that make you selfish?”
I look at him then. He’s drawn up one leg, an elbow resting on his knee. He’s watching me with those inquisitive eyes, the same way he did in the hospital, like he’s trying to figure me out, read the lines I’m not saying.
“Because sometimes I resent them for it, for needing me.”
I’ve never said that aloud. Because who would I say it to? Wren would tell me to put up boundaries, to do something for myselffinally, but I don’t want to hear that. I don’t want to be more selfish than I already am, quietly resenting this life, wishing for something different.
