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Nineteen
Abby stoodon the edge of the mountain and looked at the valley below. She and Max had traversed a steep narrow trail to reach the peak, the sun hot overhead, the desert still aroundthem.
It had been therapeutic after the activity of the past couple of days and the small wake held on the ranch where her father had worked, a generous offer that came right as Abby was agonizing over how to organize a service for a man like her father — a man with few friends, without a career that would guarantee attendance by coworkers, with no gravesite to gather around with flowers andprayers.
The wake had been perfect, a casual cookout with her father’s coworkers and the family who owned the ranch, wizened cowboys mingling with easygoing wives and laughing children who ran through the crowd, oblivious to the fact that the occasion was a somberone.
Tears had stung Abby’s eyes as people came up to talk to her in a steady stream — other employees of the ranch who’d been loaned money by her father, who had been given surprisingly wise advice, one who had even started going toAA.
Her father had been liked and admired. She wondered if he’d known. If at the end he’d felt some measure of redemption for the life he’dlived.
She hopedso.
“Youokay?”
She looked over to see Max studyingher.
She nodded. “You were right. This is a good spot. A perfectspot.”
He scanned the valley below. “It’squiet.”
The desert was stretched out in front of them, faint trails marked in the dust through the cactus and the sagebrush that blew stiffly in the warmbreeze.
“It’s peaceful,” she said. “I wish I’d been able to bring him here before he died. He would have lovedit.”
Tears streamed down hercheeks.
Max reached out and put his arm around her shoulders, pulling her close enough to kiss herhead.
“Heknows.”
She looked up at him. “He knowswhat?”
“Everything,” Max said. “He knows everythingnow.”
Abby stifled a sob and turned into him, letting loose the waves of grief she’d been holding as they’d hiked up thetrail.
When she’d caught her breath, she slid her backpack off and reached inside for the simple urn holding her father’s ashes. She set the backpack on the ground and turned toward the expanse of sky in front ofher.
She wasn’t ready to let go. She wasn’t ready to saygoodbye.
They’d only just gotten to know each other. She’d never gotten to say all the things she wanted to say. She’d never gotten to tell him about all the times she’d hatedhim.
Or about all the times she’d lovedhim.
She hadn’t gotten to tell him she forgave him or to hear him say he wassorry.
“I didn’t get to say it,” shesaid.
“What?” Maxasked.
“Anything.”
He tucked a piece of hair behind her ear. “So tell himnow.”
She opened the lid on the urn and closed her eyes, tears pouring down herface.
You were an imperfect man, an imperfect father, but you were myfather.
