“I know that.” I looked at my coffee. “And that’s what I can’t get past. He did something terrible, yes. But what stays with meis that when his worst moment came, his instinct was to remove himself from the equation before I could choose to stay.”
“He didn’t trust you to make that choice.”
“No.”
“Or,” she said carefully, “he didn’t trust himself to deserve it.”
I sat with that one for longer than the others. “That’s not my problem to solve,” I said finally.
“No,” she agreed. “It’s not.”
The bakery had filled around us without my noticing. The morning traffic of a Thursday — people getting coffee, a table of older women with a spiral-bound notebook between them. Ordinary, unhurried.
“I don’t know what I’m going to do,” I said.
“You don’t have to have everything worked out.” Indira reached across the table and covered my hand for a moment.
“I’m a therapist. I know exactly how this is supposed to work. Give it time. Follow the process. Don’t force the conclusion.” I shook my head slightly. “It’s a lot easier to believe from the other side of the desk.”
We sat there for another hour. She didn’t tell me what to do. She didn’t defend him or condemn him or give me a timeline. She just sat across from me, drank her coffee and let me be in the middle of it without trying to locate the end.
Walking back to my car, I thought about what she’d said —he didn’t trust himself to deserve it.I turned it over. It didn’t soften anything. It just sat down next to the anger and took up its own space.
I had a client at two. A woman working through something not entirely different — a man who’d hurt her, the question of whether the hurt was the whole story. I knew exactly what I’d say to her. The same careful, true things I always said. The same things I’d just told Indira I needed to do myself. Give yourself time. Don’t force the conclusion. Trust the process.
I got in the car and took the long way without meaning to — down Garrison, past the turn for the clubhouse, the route I used to take when I was heading to him. I caught myself three blocks in and corrected, but the fact that my hands had known the way before my brain did told me everything I wasn’t ready to hear.
I believed in all of it. I just didn’t believe it would work on me.
Chapter 15
?
— Holden —
The cemetery was quiet at dawn.
I’d been putting this off for weeks. Since the funeral, since I’d stood at the back and watched them lower Danny’s casket into the ground while his mother wept and my brothers held their fists over their hearts.
I hadn’t been back since. Couldn’t face it. Couldn’t face him.
Danny’s grave was marked with a simple headstone. Black granite, white letters. Daniel “Danny” Curtis. Beloved Son. Brother in Arms. The dates underneath made my stomach turn. Nineteen years old. He’d barely lived.
I crouched down in front of the stone, my knees pressing into the damp grass. “Hey, kid.”
My voice sounded wrong out here. The words felt stupid—talking to dirt and stone. But I kept going anyway. “I fucked up.” I let out a breath that was almost a laugh. “You used to give me shit about being too uptight. Remember that?” I pressed my palm against the cold granite. “Well, I loosened up. And I destroyed everything.”
A bird sang somewhere in the trees. Otherwise, silence.
“You saved my life,” I continued. “Stepped in front of a bullet meant for me. Died in my arms asking if you’d proved yourself. And you know what I did with that life you saved?” My voice cracked. “I drank myself into oblivion and cheated on Bea. While she was with your mother because I asked her to go.”
The words hung in the air, ugly and true.
“I went to her apartment and told her, Danny. Showed up at her door in my riding gear and said the words. Some club girl I don’t even remember—and I told her that too, that I don’t remember, like that was supposed to make it better.” I stopped. Swallowed. “And then I left. Didn’t give her a chance to say anything. Just made the decision for both of us and walked out, because that’s what I do, right? I plan the exit.”
I sat down fully on the grass, not caring that it was wet, that my jeans were getting soaked.
“I haven’t called her. Haven’t tried. I keep telling myself she doesn’t want to hear from me, but the truth is I’m too much of a coward to find out.” I shook my head. “You were always better with people than me. Didn’t overthink everything the way I do.”
