She's quiet for so long I think she's not going to answer. Then, "Every day."
The honesty of it stings, but I asked for truth.
"Why didn't you?"
"Because I loved you." She says it simply. "Because I kept thinking you'd get better, that we'd get through it together. Because leaving someone when they're drowning felt like giving up."
"But eventually, you let me go."
"Eventually," she agrees softly, "I realized that sometimes loving someone means letting them save themselves. That I couldn't fix you, couldn't make the nightmares stop or the guilt go away. You needed to do that on your own."
"And then you found out you were pregnant."
"And then I found out I was pregnant." She turns to look at me fully now, her brown eyes searching my face. "And I had to make a choice, Cade. Keep you tied to me and to a town that was killing you, force you into fatherhood when you were barely surviving, or—"
"Or make the decision for me." I finish the sentence, and there's an edge to my voice I can't quite control.
"Yes," she admits. "Or make the decision for both of us."
"Was it the right decision?" I ask, genuinely curious about her answer.
Sierra looks back at Ruby, who's now teaching her new friend how to do the monkey bars. "I thought so at the time. Now?I don't know. I look at her and see how much she's like you, how much she needs you already after just one day, and I think—" Her voice breaks. "I think maybe I was wrong. Maybe I underestimated you. Maybe I underestimated what you could have become if you'd known about her."
"Or maybe," I say slowly, working through the thought as I speak, "you were right. Maybe if I'd known seven years ago, when I was barely functional, I would have come back out of obligation. Would have tried to be a father when I couldn't even take care of myself. And maybe that would have been worse for everyone."
Sierra looks at me sharply. "What are you saying?"
"I'm saying I'm trying to understand." I run a hand through my hair, frustrated by my inability to articulate the complicated tangle of emotions. "I'm angry that you kept her from me. Hurt that you made that choice without me. But I'm also trying to see it from your perspective. You watched me break. You knew what going back to that town would do to me. And you were pregnant and scared and had to make an impossible choice with no good options."
"That doesn't make it right," Sierra says quietly.
"No," I agree. "But it makes it human. It makes it understandable, even if I'm not ready to say it was okay."
We sit with that, the tension between us easing slightly. Not gone but softened around the edges.
Ruby comes running over, breathless and pink-cheeked. "Did you see me? I made it all the way across the monkey bars! Twice!"
"We saw," I assure her. "You were amazing."
"Can we see the lake now? Please?" She's bouncing on the balls of her feet, endless energy barely contained.
"Lead the way," Sierra says, standing and brushing off her jeans.
We follow Ruby down the path that winds around the lake. She runs ahead, stopping every few feet to examine something: a pinecone, an interesting rock, a bird she thinks might be a hawk but is probably a crow.
"She's curious about everything," Sierra explains, falling into step beside me. "Always has to touch, investigate, understand how things work."
"That's good," I say. "Curiosity is important."
"It's exhausting is what it is." But Sierra's smiling. "Do you know how many times I've had to explain why the sky is blue? Or where clouds come from? Or why we can't keep every injured animal we find?"
"Sounds like she keeps you on your toes."
"That's one way to put it."
The lake is peaceful, surrounded by pine trees and aspens just starting to bud. There are a few other people out, an elderly couple walking hand in hand, a jogger with headphones, but mostly it's just us.
"I've thought about it," Sierra says suddenly. "Moving here, I mean. I haven't been able to stop thinking about it."
