There’s the old covered bridge, suddenly right there around the curve, amber light washing the weathered boards, creek sparkling beneath. Jordan pulls over onto the gravel shoulder, shuts off the engine.
Silence. The kind that settles fast and total: no radio, no motor, just the water moving below and the truck ticking as it cools.
I don’t move at first. I settle my hands in my lap, force my face calm. I’ve rehearsed this scene in my head, always expecting Drew to invade it: Drew’s proposal, Drew’s laughter echoing offthe water. In this town, every corner is a Drew story, and this bridge might as well have his name carved on every plank.
I brace myself, jaw tight, ready for that story.
But Jordan just steps out, waiting by the creek’s edge, hands deep in their pockets. They look at the bridge for a long time, jaw working like there’s something caught behind their teeth.
Then they sit down on a flat stone near the water’s edge, pat the space beside them. I join, knees folding automatically, gravity stronger than my resolve.
Jordan starts talking—not about Drew, not at first. “First time I tried to leave this town, I was seventeen. Packed three shirts, a toothbrush, and a copy of On the Road with more highlights than sense.”
I watch their profile, the sharpness of jaw and cheek, the mouth caught between a smile and something more hesitant. They keep their hands busy, working at a loose thread on their flannel. “Made it to Montpelier. Then I turned around. Couldn’t say why, just… did.” They twist the thread, release, twist again. “Tried at twenty-two for a job in Burlington. Lasted six months. Came back. Tried again at twenty-six. Eight months. Came back.”
The creek’s song fills the pauses, relentless, a counterpoint to my scattered heartbeat.
“Everybody has a theory. Melvin blames stubbornness. Drew used to say I’m basically a concussed pigeon with no sense of direction.” The smallest catch on Drew’s name, but Jordan powers on. “Me? I think it’s just this place. Doesn’t matter if I’m gone six days or six months—it’s the only honest thing I’ve ever known, and I can’t explain that without sounding cheesy as hell.”
My jaw unclenches, bit by bit. That hard, defensive line in my chest softens, replaced by a slow, confused warmth. This isn’t the Drew story. Not even close.
I find myself asking, “Did you ever figure out why?” My voice sounds unfamiliar, fragile. This question is about Jordan, and only Jordan.
Jordan looks at me, really looks. “Figure out why what?”
“Why you kept coming back. If you couldn’t explain it.”
There’s a beat. The creek fills it, patient as ever.
“I think,” Jordan says, picking through their words, “it’s because the things that hurt here are the same things that held me. Same people. Same streets. It’s all tangled together, and somewhere along the line, I decided the holding was worth the hurt.” They stop working the thread, let their hands fall. “Still deciding, some days.”
The honesty of it sits between us, exposed and raw. I’ve known Jordan Vale for years, but I’ve never seen this side—the one that doesn’t hide behind jokes or work or bravado.
Jordan shifts, turns to me, and the half-grin returns, gentle now. “Your turn. Question for a question.”
I could ask about Drew. I could ask for the safe story, the one we all know. Instead, I blurt, “What’s the worst job you’ve ever done?”
The laugh that breaks from Jordan is sudden and infectious, ricocheting off the low beams of the bridge. “Oh, hands down—the Hemsley basement. Remember that storm in 2018? Sump pump died, basement went aqua, and I spent half the day wading in with a shop vac. Learned a new level of regret that day.”
“Worse than the raccoon nest?”
“By a mile. At least the raccoons had style. Basement water doesn’t even try.”
I can’t help it—I laugh, full and genuine, not the polite customer-service laugh, but the real thing, bright as a bell. Jordan’s eyes track me, soft and intent, and for a second it’s toomuch, this moment suspended between us, almost exquisite in its possibility.
We talk, and the stories unfurl, slow and easy. Jordan confesses to sliding off the Stocking’s roof on a cardboard sled, right into Mrs. Pelletier’s hydrangeas. I tell them about the time I botched a paint mix at the hardware store and invented a new color that Rodney called “visionary” because Rodney is a saint. Sunlight drifts through the bridge’s slats, painting stripes over us as the day slips toward evening.
Somewhere in the story about Melvin’s hardware feud (now apparently in its third presidential administration and fueled by pipe fittings and scathing letters to the paper), I notice it: my hands are relaxed, my breath is easy, and the heaviness I brought with me today has lightened, almost completely, just for this little while.
Jordan watches me, eyes steady, and this time I don’t look away. The drawbridge I built around myself isn’t gone, but it’s different now, the walls moving, shifting, making room for something new and unexpected.
“You’re doing it again,” I say, breaking the silence.
“Doing what?”
“Looking at me like you’re reading the fine print on my soul.”
Their lips quirk. “Is it working?”
