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“Steal a tractor?” I chuckle.

At that, he cough-laughs again, wagging a finger at me. “Nah, that doesn’t count!”

Didn’t it? Made me feel better in the moment.

Made me feel terrible every day after, though.

“Stealing my tractor, or breaking a fence, or drinking till you can’t see straight, that’s all avoiding the issue.”

I don’t say anything, just shake my head, trying not to remember all the ways I kept myself from feeling the pain. It sent me down a terrible path.

“You’ll never be able to move past it if you don’t let yourself feel it,” he says. “That’s the way it works with these things.”

“What if feeling it is too hard?” I say.

“It’s supposed to be hard,” Rip says.

“And if you feel like it’s all your fault?”

He looks at me. “Were you the one driving that car?”

My gaze falls to the weathered boards of the porch. “No, but . . .”

“You can take responsibility for the parts of your past that you could control.” He leans forward, elbows on his knees. “But the parts you couldn’t? That’s not your burden to carry.”

“Well, there’s plenty there,” I say. “To take responsibility for.”

I didn’t plan to have a heart to heart with Rip McCauley, but here we are.

“Then make it right and move on,” he says. “No sense beating yourself up over it.”

I huff out a quiet laugh. “You make it sound so easy.”

“It is.” He leans back in his chair. “Someone wearin’ your shoes is making it hard.”

We’re both quiet for a long few seconds. I don’t know what’s on his mind, but the whole conversation has me feeling out of sorts. Because of course I need to feel guilty. I screwed everything up. I don’t automatically get a pass for that.

But then I think about Briggs and Melinda. And the Holbrook brothers. The school. Walt. Even Hattie. All willing to accept my apology and move on, to offer grace I don’t deserve.

But maybe Rip’s right. I haven’t been willing to offer the same to myself.

I think about what Melinda said at dinner my first night back in town. “Grace isn’t a thing that runs out. And it’s not something you have to earn. That’s the whole point.”

That’s the whole point.

Am I finally getting that point?

I finish my lemonade and say my goodbyes to Rip and Joni. My thank-you’s felt small in the wake of their understanding.

I make my way back out to the truck, and when I get there, I pull out the list, find a pen in the center console, and cross out his name.

But then, before I fold it back up and tuck it away, I add one name at the bottom.

Noble Kane.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Hattie