Page 59 of Broken Cedar

I nod even though she can’t see me and finish my pancake.

Mom sets the clean pan in the rack by the sink, dries her hands on a dish towel, and turns to look at me. She’s looking at me like she wants to say something, but thinks better of it.

I stand warily and carry my plate to the sink. She turns on the faucet to wash it and I pick up the dish towel. We do the dishes in silence. Mom rinses a spatula before handing it to me to dry.

“Are you planning on saying a proper goodbye to Colt before you leave?”

I almost drop the spatula. I catch it and start drying it. My hands keep moving because if my hands stop moving, I might have to acknowledge what just came out of my mother’s mouth.

“I already have,” I say quietly.

Mom shakes soap off her hands and turns off the faucet. Then she turns and looks at me.

“Not the goodbye I meant.”

The kitchen goes very quiet. My heart does something complicated in my chest, a weird arrhythmia that feels suspiciously like panic.

“Mom,” I say, then stop, because I have no idea what else to say. I take a deep breath and rack my brain for something to say, but Mom beats me to it.

“You two have been walking around this house for a week looking at each other like you’re trying to memorize something. And the walls in this place are thinner than you think they are, Hallie. A lot thinner.”

I stare at her in horror. The dish towel is still in my hand. I’m gripping it so tight my knuckles have gone white.

Mom leans against the counter and crosses her arms. “You know he’s not your actual brother,” she says.

“I know that,” I say quietly, avoiding her gaze.

“You didn’t grow up thinking of him as your brother. You two were always like best friends, not siblings.” She uncrosses her arms and picks up a coffee mug that doesn’t need drying, and dries it anyway. “Jim married me when you were what, eleven? Twelve? Colt was fourteen. You weren’t kids. You didn’t share a bedroom. You didn’t share a bathroom. You shared a house, and a last name eventually, but you never shared the particular thing that makes siblings siblings. You know that, right?”

“I know,” I say again.

Mom sets the mug down and looks at me. “You left eight years ago,” she says.

“I know.”

“No.” She shakes her head. “I don’t think you do.”

The dish towel is still in my hand. I set it down before I risk tearing it.

“That boy walked around here for months acting like he’d lost something.” Her voice doesn’t change. “It was like watching him lose his father all over again. And I couldn’t—” She stops and starts again. “There was nothing I could do. Because the thing he lost was you, and you weren’t here, and every time your name came up in conversation, he’d pretend he didn’t care.”

“He never said anything,” I say thickly.

“Neither did you.” Mom picks up the dish towel and hangs it on the oven handle. We’re both silent, neither one of us knowing what to say next.

“If you’re asking whether I think there’s something wrong with loving Colt,” she says eventually, pausing to look at me. “No, I don’t.”

My heart does something in my chest that might be hope or might be terror or might be both.

“What I think is wrong,” Mom continues, her voice steady, “is spending another eight years pretending you don’t.”

I open my mouth to argue. To explain. To tell her she’s wrong. Nothing comes out. Because she isn’t wrong.

“I didn’t leave because I didn’t love him,” I hear myself whisper. Mom doesn’t say anything. She just waits. The words feel strange in my mouth, like they’ve been trapped there for years. “I left because I loved him too much.”

Saying it out loud doesn’t make it feel smaller. It makes it feel like the truest thing I’ve ever admitted.

“I knew if I stayed…” My voice catches. “Everything would’ve been him.” I laugh once, without humor. “The ranch. The horses. This house.” I shake my head. “He would’ve become the center of my whole life.” I swallow. “And if I ever lost him the way you lost Jim…” I can’t finish the sentence. My eyes are burning in that way that means I’m about to cry. I blink rapidly, trying to fend them off.