Page 17 of Everything But Mine

“You made your bed. You lie in it, Eric. Face the consequences of your actions.”

By then, I was raising my voice, frustration boiling over. He staggered forward a few steps, not backing down, his arms swinging, tequila sloshing over the rim.

His voice is as loud as I have ever heard it. “You think I don’t know this is my own fucking fault? Me, rotting in regret, and you going about your life and posting make out⁠—”

“Don’t you fucking dare!” I was in his face, screaming back. My hands clenched at my sides, shaking, everything I’d held dancing at the tip of my tongue. I refused to let this conversation happen. There was no point in ever opening that can of worms. “You have no place shaming me for anything I decide to do with anybody.”

I braced myself for another insult, another round of screaming, but instead, he deflated. Completely. His head dipped, his grip slackened around the bottle, and when he spoke again, his voice was barely there.

“You’re right.” He took another swig, then let out a shuddering breath. “Of course you’re right. What I did—” His breath hitched, a strangled sound somewhere between a sob and a gasp. “I hurt you. I saw it in your eyes.”

“Stop it, Eric.” My voice was quieter now, but just as firm. I had no strength to hash out anything that rushed my decision to leave back then. I had no strength left to unpack it, not when I had thrown all my strength at shoving it down.

Eric’s head tilted toward the waterfall, his gaze lost in the rush of the water, the edges of the rocks, the dip of the slope. The temperature shifted, and the cold didn’t just bite; it sucked the anger out of me.

I took a step forward, gently placing my hand between his shoulder blades. Being in another continent, it was easy to sweep everything under the rug and compartmentalize. Having Eric in front of me, it was impossible not to be consumed by this man who was once my person.

“I just want to—” He choked on his own words. “I want to let go.”

“Eric—” I pressed my palm into his coat. His spine protruding against my touch was new and wrong.

“No!” He took a step back, putting space between us. His foot slipped slightly, but he caught himself, swaying. “You’ve taken no shit from me since being back, and I respect that. Don’t change that because I’m pathetic.”

My pulse thundered in my ears. He has to know I wouldn’t coddle him. However, I was also a therapist, and I wouldn’t ignore a person in crisis. This wasn’t yet a crisis, and I wouldn’t let it become one.

“Just let me be—or not be…”

As he spoke, the jittery urge to glance at the waterfall morphed, settling on a quiet ache. A flicker of yearning, or maybe regret, crossed his face. When he turned, his foot slipped on the wet rock. And he fell.

The moment stretched—his body pitching backward as if in slow motion, arms flailing for balance that wouldn’t come. His eyes met mine, widening with something that wasn’t quite fear. Then⁠—

He was gone.

The impact was immediate. A violent splash, water surging up determined on swallowing him whole. For a second, nothing. No movement, no resurfacing, just the gaping silence after the crash.

His head broke through the surface farther down, toward the river’s pull. Before he could fight his way up, though, the current yanked him back under. When he resurfaced again, he wasn’t trying to swim back.

My heart hammered against my ribs as I moved quickly, yet calculating. Not where I’d just seen him, closer to the second line of rocks, closer to where he should be coming up next, closer to where I could reach him.

The moon cast a white glint over the water and rock. Every splash, every flicker of movement, made my pulse stumble over rocks. A vague outline, a heavier shadow dragged by the rushing water downstream. My pulse slammed in my throat. I pushed forward, boots skidding, icy spray biting my face. Get to him. Get to him. I dropped to my knees.

“Eric, grab me!”

He tried. His hand slipped. A sharp “No” tore from me. I lunged, down to my shoulders into the water, catching his coat, locking on this time. The fabric was soaked and becoming rigid as the river water crystallized into ice beneath my grip, slippery, making it even harder to hold onto.

I wrapped my arms under his shoulders, heaving with everything I had as I pulled him toward me. Frigid water dripped onto me and seeped through my clothes to my skin. He didn’t help me—he couldn’t. The fight had drained from his limbs, all of his strength burned up just trying to breathe. I lost my balance and almost dropped us both forward, back into the river, but I grabbed onto his belt and pulled—one last pull.

His body spilled onto the rocks, collapsing against me, coughing up half the river. My arms were still locked around him, frozen, shaking, holding too tight. His weight on me felt oppressive, the contracting and expanding of his chest as he coughed, feeling larger than life. I just held on to him. Not ready to let go.

Not yet.

It took time we didn’t have to make our way back to the cabin, Eric stumbling beside me, his arms draped over my shoulders, steps uneven, breath coming in sharp gasps. He wasn’t shivering anymore. His body was past that point—too cold to shake.

The house was silent as we stepped into the cabin our families have always shared, the scent of old wood, the faintest trace of coffee left over from hours ago. The warmth from finally being indoors helped, but it wasn't enough. Anger, fear and confusion twisted together so tightly I didn’t know which would come out first.

“Do you have any idea how stupid that was?” I hissed, my voice sharp but quiet. Anger won.

He blinked at me, slow and unfocused, trying to wade through molasses just to process what I was saying. His hair was dripping, the ends already starting to stiffen from the cold.