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I didn’t want to think about what it meant.
I was a little scared of what it meant.
When we’d met, he’d been so closed off, so… almost cold, and he’d been unwilling to talk about anything. Yet he’d taken me to that bench. He’d said what it was. I hadn’t even noticed the memorial plaque until he’d pointed it out to me.
It had just left me with more questions than answers.
When had she died?
How had she died?
What about his father?
I sighed, dropping my head forwards. I needed a break from my break.
“You all right over there?” Fred asked, looking over. “Sorry. You said not to talk.”
I lifted my head and forced a smile. “Writing is hard,” I replied.
He laughed. “I’m sure. Can’t say I’ve ever tried it myself.”
“Don’t. It’s a trap.”
“Anything I can help with?”
I smiled gratefully. “No but thank you. I’ll just stare at the page until I give up, eat my body weight in sugar, and have it randomly come to me while I’m halfway through chopping an onion in a week’s time when it’ll be so overwhelming that I’ll go to write it down and ultimately forget to eat.”
Fred raised his eyebrows. “That does sound stressful.”
“Just a bit.” I laughed, leaning back in the chair. “It’s fine. Today clearly isn’t my day for writing.” I blew out a breath and stared at the screen. All the words blurred together. Not even changing it to dark mode had helped like it usually did.
It glared at me.
“Something on your mind?”
I slowly swung my gaze towards Fred. “That obvious, huh?”
He pressed his lips together. “I saw you yesterday. You and Max.”
I said nothing.
“At his mum’s bench.”
“How?”
“Esme couldn’t find him for something with the goats—or so she said—and asked me to look for him. It’s somewhere he goes when he needs a moment.” Fred’s smile was sad, and he pushed his laptop away from him. “I saw you together and didn’t want to intrude.”
“Thank you.”
He nodded. “You don’t know, do you?”
How she died.
I knew that was what he was asking.
“No.” I fidgeted, rubbing my fingers. “I know how he feels about a lot of things, and he’s never really brought it up, and I didn’t want to ask.”
“I thought as much.” He eyed me for a moment. “It’s not my place to tell you how his parents died.”
