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I nod. “Everyone gets a little stage fright. Tell me exactly what you’re worried will happen.”
“People could laugh. Or it might not work.”
“Has it ever not worked before?” I ask.
He stares at his tiny knees, pressed tight together. “No.”
“Why would people laugh?”
“If I mess up.”
I take a seat on the step beside him and pull him into my lap, pointing to the ladder built onto the back wall. “You know how they build a ladder like that?” I ask quietly. “By nailing the first rung and then climbing on that rung to nail up the next. And life’s a little like that ladder. A good life is made up of all these brave moments. And you use the confidence you get from the first brave moment to move on to the bigger and better ones. But how are you ever going to get there if you won’t take that first step?”
His eyes meet mine. I have no idea if he’s gotten the analogy. “Is Caleb coming?”
There’s a pinch in my chest. “I’m sure he’d have wanted to. I didn’t invite him.”
He frowns. “Why not?”
There are so many answers on the tip of my tongue. Yes, Caleb couldn’t have come. He’ll be heading to the airport soon, perhaps with his wife. But Henry’s asking a bigger question. He wants to know why we no longer talk to Caleb or talkaboutCaleb and why I’ve stopped saying ‘maybe’or ‘I hope so’ when Henry asks if we’ll see him soon. And I have answers for that too, but I’m not sure they’re entirely truthful.
Can I honestly say Caleb didn’t want us? Can I honestly say it was never going to work out?
I can’t. Because I was too scared to push for the answer. Caleb is terrified of repeating what he lived through before, but I was terrified too. I worried that I’d keep trying and he’d say,‘no thanks,’the way both my parents did at various points—Jeremy as well. That I’d let my kids love him and he’d say‘no thanks’ to them too.
I didn’t reply to his text today. I didn’t even ask him about Kate after I met her. I just ran away, so scared of wounding us that I denied us the very small chance we could have been healed.
“Because I wasn’t brave,” I admit to Henry.
He raises his eyes to me, questioning, waiting for me to make the same concession I am asking of him.
It’s not going to change anything, I long to argue. But I guess I can let Caleb say what he’s going to say. I guess I can let him tell me he’s moved on.
Henry rises, pressing his lips to my forehead—the way I kiss him at night. And then he points over my shoulder. “Okay. Caleb’s over there. If you’ll be brave now, I’ll be brave too.”
“What?” I stare at him, wondering if this is some metaphor I don’t understand or a game of pretend. But I follow his gaze...and see Caleb in the corner, talking to one of the teachers and watching us with that anxious furrow between his brows.
He has a plane to catch. I can’t imagine why he’d be here unless something disastrous has happened.
I rise slowly and walk to him, my heart beating so fast in my chest that it’s hard to breathe.
“Lucie,” he says, pulling my hands into his. “Can I...can we—?”
He looks around and then pulls me behind a pillar, where we are hidden from view.
My mouth opens, but he stops me. “Let me go first, okay? I’m not with Kate.” He binds my wrists with his large palms, begging me to meet his eye. “I had no idea she was coming, but I’m not with her. I love you, and I’m so fucking sorry it took me this long to say it. I’m so fucking sorry I freaked out last week. But if you’ll just take me back, I swear to God—” his voice cracks. He stops, swallowing. “I swear to God, I’ll do better.”
I press my face to his chest, and it all comes out—the pain I’ve held in for the past hour and the past week and the past month. His hold on me tightens.
“What about your flight?” I ask, wiping my eyes.
“I’m not going.”
“But—”
He shakes his head. “It’s done. You guys come first now, andI’m not putting it off until Monday or next year or when the twins have left for college. It wouldn’t have worked anyway...How the hell could I have you and the twins on the west coast when I was working in New York?”
I swallow hard to keep from bursting into tears again.
