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Is it bad that I want it to be raining where you are? That I want the weather to be gloomy—dark and gray, so maybe, just maybe, in hopes that you’re as miserable there as I am here without you.
I look around at all of the happy families preparing for the holidays and I think back to this time last year, and I ache for you to be here. It literally hurts, Myles. I didn’t even know missing someone could physically hurt. But it can.
Sometimes, on days when the weather is nice, I sit out in the garden and I play games with myself. I pretend that you’re there in my office above the barn waiting for me... or that you’re out working and I’m waiting for you. And sometimes, I swear I even see you there, coming around the bend. And just for a second, I can breathe easily again. Until I realize that it’s not real and my heart sinks.
I die a thousand tiny deaths every time I play this game.
And yet I play.
Be safe and hurry home.
Love,
Jess
From: [email protected]
Subject: RE: Today, I’m not even going to pretend.
Dear Jess,
I’m sorry it’s taken me several days to get back with you. I hope you’re in a better place now. It kills me that you’re hurting. If I had known what I know now, I never would have come. I’m sorry for that, Jess. I’m sorry for putting you through this.
The truth is you were right. There comes a certain point where the people you love dictate where you want to be. And I want to be back in Texas, there with you, where I left my heart.
But the good news is that I’ll be home soon.
As of today, there are exactly seven months and eighteen days until I hold you in my arms again…
Love,
M
Three days before Christmas, Jess was in her office wrapping the last of the kids’ gifts when there was a knock at the door. “Miss Jessica.” Dean.
“Come in.”
“There are some people here to see you, ma’am.” Jess frowned. He sounded out of breath.
She looked over her shoulder. His expression was twisted. Jess exhaled and dropped the scissors. “I’m coming…”
She started for the stairs and stopped when she saw the uniforms. Her face fell and she shook her head slowly. Slowly, she made her way down the stairs, one by one.
She straightened her back. No. No. No. “Can I help you?”
“Are you Mrs. Clemens?”
She nodded.
“Mrs. Clemens, we regretfully inform you that Myles Ingram was killed in the line of duty yesterday.”
Jess collapsed and all she remembers now were the wails that came from somewhere deep within her body, guttural screams, and then Dean catching her and the rocking back and forth, back and forth. There were other things that happened that afternoon. Like Romeo trying to attack the officers when the screaming began and him lying at Jess’s side, his head in her lap. At some point, Addison arrived and her mother took the children. But she wouldn’t remember any of that. She only recalled the screams, the sound of herself begging, pleading with anyone and everyone, for the words they’d uttered not to be true.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
The days and weeks that followed will always be remembered as somewhat of a blur. There were moments of extreme clarity, for example, when decisions needed to be made. Jess was informed via a letter that Myles had designated her as the person to make these decisions. Oddly enough, they’d never discussed this, but the more Jess considered it, the more she realized that, to her knowledge, there was no one else to make them.
