Blake kept an eye on the ground as he picked his way up a steep slope of crumbling stairs. There were no handrails, and while he may not have a life plan yet, he knew it didn’t include tumbling off the Great Wall of China.
FEA arrived in Beijing yesterday for their big fall semester trip. After a short night’s rest, the laoshis hustled them to the Great Wall this morning. Instead of going to Badaling or Mutianyu—the most touristy and therefore easiest-to-navigate sections of the Wall—they were hiking from Jinshanling to Simatai by foot. No cable cars, just steep stairs and more vertical climbs than Blake cared for.
On a normal day, Blake could’ve completed the hike in three hours instead of the usual four, but he was so distracted he lagged behind his friends, even Kris.
Well, not all of his friends.
Blake reached the next watchtower and drank from his water bottle. He watched Farrah out of the corner of his eye as she inched her way up the stairs toward him, her face pink with exertion.
She stumbled on a loose stone and pitched forward. Blake’s heart stopped. He reached out to help her, but Farrah regained her balance and scrambled up the rest of the stairs.
Blake’s heartbeat returned to normal.
“Are you ok?” he asked.
“Yeah.” Farrah brushed a stray strand of hair out of her eyes.
It was the first word she’d said to him in six days (not that he was counting). She’d avoided him since Macau, and he didn’t blame her. He’d acted like a dick that night.
Farrah brushed past him and hauled herself through the watchtower window onto the next stretch of the wall. Blake followed suit. He waited until they edged across the narrow path beneath the watchtower and reached the broader main section before he spoke.
“So, how are you liking the hike?” He winced the instant the words left his mouth. Lame.
“Fine.”
Blake tried a different tack. “Have you been to Beijing before?”
“No.”
“It’s an interesting city.”
“Mmhmm.”
“Heard the laoshis are serving us poisonous mushrooms for dinner tonight.”
“Great.”
Blake groaned. “Farrah.”
“What?”
“Talk to me.”
“I am talking to you.”
Multiple words. That was an improvement. “Look, I know I acted like an asshole last week. I’m sorry.” Blake stumbled over the last word because he’d still tear that guy’s arm off if he had the chance.
The image of Farrah and Douchebag making out flashed through his mind. Blake’s jaw clenched.
He wasn’t sorry about tearing Douchebag away from her. He was sorry about the way he treated Farrah. He’d been hopped up on his own issues and jealousy and took them out on her.
Plus, that bit about loving her like a sister? Complete bullshit.
If Blake thought about Joy the way he thought about Farrah, he was in for some serious hell in the afterlife.
“Apology accepted.”
Silence fell.
Blake struggled to come up with the right words to say. Farrah walked beside him, yet she was so distant he expected her to slip through his fingers and fade into the air at any moment.
They passed through the next few watchtowers without a word. Slope after slope, one step after another.
After an hour, they stopped to rest. Farrah sank onto the ground. “You can go ahead,” she said. “You don’t have to stay with me.”
“I want to.”
Farrah slid a puzzled glance in his direction before turning to survey the landscape. Blake followed her gaze. It was a scene he’d seen multiple times in pictures, but nothing compared to the real thing. Not even close.
Rugged mountains encircled them like sentinels, draped in cloaks of silence. The ancient wall sighed as they stood on its back, following in the footsteps of the thousands who came before them. Nevertheless, it snaked through the rough terrain, endlessly and persistently, as it had for millennia.
The wall cut a striking figure amongst the explosion of red, orange, and green foliage before it disappeared into the low-hanging mist in the distance. Every so often a breeze swept by, carrying with it the whispers of history—the dynasties that rose and fell; the ghosts of emperors past and lives sacrificed; the faded screams of ancient warriors who’d fought on this very land.
Goosebumps erupted on Blake’s skin. He found it hard to wrap his mind around the fact that he was standing on thousands of years of history. He remembered visiting the Alamo as a kid and marveling at how old it was.
Compared to the Great Wall, the Alamo was a freakin’ fetus.
“He always wanted to come here.”
Blake sat next to Farrah. His feet sighed in relief. “Who?”
“My dad.”
“There’s still time. I have a feeling the wall will be here for a while,” Blake joked.
Farrah looked down. “He died four years ago.”
Ah, fuck. “I’m so sorry.” Blake felt like an ass. He couldn’t do anything right these days.
“It’s ok. You didn’t know.” Her smile wobbled and lasted five seconds before it fell.
It broke Blake’s heart. He was shit at comforting people. He never knew what to say, and tears made him more uncomfortable than a nun who stumbled into an orgy. If this were anyone else, Blake would’ve gotten the fuck outta there.
But this wasn’t anyone else. This was Farrah.
He placed a tentative arm around her shoulders. To his relief, she didn’t pull away.
“My dad spent most of his life in China and never saw its most famous landmark.” Farrah played with the pendant around her neck. “He used to tell me we’ll visit together. One day, he said, we’ll fly to Beijing and walk the entire wall, from one end to the other. It’ll be the greatest father-daughter hike ever taken. I was only seven at the time, but even I knew it was impossible to walk the entire wall. Still, I liked imagining it. It seemed like a great adventure.”
Her voice thickened with unshed tears.
Blake squeezed her tight, wishing he could do more to help.
Farrah sniffled and wiped her nose with the back of her hand. “Anyway, tell me about your dad. Are you guys close?”
Blake swallowed. He had to battle his instinct to avoid the question before he got his answer out. “We were. Once. A long time ago.”
When he was a kid, his dad would take him to the zoo and make funny faces imitating the animals until Blake howled with laughter. He took Blake fishing every two months and almost came to blows with Ted Crenshaw’s dad after Ted pushed Blake at recess and Blake skinned his knee.
Then Blake grew up and displayed a talent for football. His dad stopped being his dad and started being his coach. He never switched back.
“What happened?”
“We grew apart.” Blake played with the ends of Farrah’s hair. They slipped across his fingers like silk. “We have different ideas of how I should live my life.”
“I’m guessing he didn’t want you to quit football.”
He barked out a laugh devoid of humor. “That’s putting it mildly. His biggest dream is for me to sign with the NFL. He played college ball too, you know, but he tore his ACL and that ended his pro dreams. So he lived those dreams through me until I quote-unquote ‘threw my future away’ because I’m an idiot who can’t do anything right except throw a ball.”
Farrah lifted her head to look at him. “That’s not true. I’ve seen how hard you work. You’re definitely more than a meathead.”
“Maybe.” Blake wasn’t sure. He spent most of his life so focused on football he didn’t have time to do much else. He was a business major, and he did well in his classes, but he didn’t have any business experience except for a summer internship after his sophomore year. He had to fight his father tooth and nail on that one. Joe Ryan didn’t understand why Blake would throw away a summer’s worth of pre-season prep to toil in an office.
He thought about his idea to start his own sports bar, but that was all he did—think about it. Blake was too afraid of what might happen if he tried to do it. The last thing he wanted was to fail and prove his father right.
“Not maybe. For sure.” Farrah’s tone brooked no opposition. “Trust me, meatheads do not pick up Mandarin as quickly as you have.”
Blake’s mouth quirked up. “Know a lot of Mandarin-learning meatheads, do you?”
“I’m from L.A. You’d be surprised.” She rubbed her arms. Blake pulled her closer. The nip in the air felt good when they were walking, but it started to bite after they stopped moving. “So why did you quit football? Most guys would kill for a chance to join the NFL.”
She wasn’t the first person to ask him that question, but she was the first person he wanted to tell the truth to.
Blake weighed his words before he answered.
“A week after we won the national championship, I ran into Dan Griffin’s wife at an alumni event. He was a Mustangs quarterback back in the day. One of the best. Played for sixteen seasons in the NFL before he retired and became a sports broadcaster.” A lump formed in Blake’s throat when he remembered the look in her eyes. She’d been so sad and angry it wrenched his heart. “He died of CTE a few days before the event.”
Chronic traumatic encephalopathy, a degenerative brain disease found in those with a history of repetitive brain trauma—such as the concussions football players often endured on the field.
Blake had heard of CTE before. He never expected it to affect someone he knew, especially not someone as larger-than-life as Dan. He was invincible, or so it seemed.
Farrah’s eyes widened. “Oh my god.”
“I was close to Dan. He came to all the games and was my mentor, in a way, but I only met his wife a few times. She wasn’t much into the football world, and I didn’t know why she wanted to talk to me specifically except…” Blake looked down. “To warn me, I guess. To get out while I can. She didn’t want what happened to Dan to happen to me.”
Their paths were similar. Both Blake and Dan were Texas born and bred, high school football stars who chose to attend TSU after a recruitment war between the country’s top Division I schools. Both Heisman winners groomed for the NFL. Both buoyed and weighed down by the expectations of those around them.
There was only one difference.
“Dan loved football,” Blake said. “He lived for it and, in the end, died for it. I like football, but it was always more for my father than myself. I would’ve been happy being a normal student instead of a so-called sports star.” Sometimes he fantasized about what his life would’ve been like had that been the case. Would his relationship with his father be any different, or would they have been at odds over something else? Would his father have resented Blake for not following the football path he himself wanted but couldn’t take? “I don’t want to die for something I don’t love.”
When Blake found out what happened to Dan, he remembered all the hits he’d taken on the field. Every tackle replayed itself in his mind, including a brutal takedown by Oklahoma’s defense his sophomore year. It had led to pain so sharp he was sure he had a concussion, but he played through it because the team was counting on him and that’s what you did.
The Mustangs won. The pain went away. But what if one day it didn’t? Blake was healthy now. If he continued along his path, he might not be.
Dan’s death wiped away the dust, and he saw the writing on his wall. Could he say the same for his friends, family, and fans? Probably not. Football was a religion in Texas. Blake would get pilloried for being selfish and overdramatic if he revealed he quit because he was worried about CTE. So he kept his mouth shut and let the speculation run wild. It was better than the alternative.
Farrah squeezed his hand. “That’s understandable. I can’t imagine anyone would be mad about that.”
“You haven’t met my father.”
Farrah’s gaze swept down.
Blake winced when he realized how callous his complaint must sound. “I’m sorry. He and I have our differences, but I know I’m lucky he’s still here.”
“It’s ok.” Farrah fiddled with her necklace again. “My dad wasn’t the greatest dad either when he was alive. I feel terrible saying that because he was a good dad for a while.” Her voice wobbled. “He had an…interesting life before he married my mom. They settled down and had me, and everything was great until it wasn’t. My parents started fighting every night over stupid stuff—what channel to watch, whose turn it was to take out the trash—until my dad moved out. I was thirteen.”
Blake’s chest tightened as Farrah spoke. Thirteen was hard enough without having to deal with your parents’ separation.
‘They separated for a year before divorcing. In that year, without my mom keeping an eye on him, my dad fell back into old bad habits. Smoking, drinking, gambling. He racked up a ton of debt, and he and my mom still had some joint accounts, so you can imagine how that went down. I remember walking into my mom’s bedroom one day after they divorced and seeing her cry. My mom never cries. I was so pissed at my dad for putting us through all of that pain that when I saw him during our next visit, I called him all these horrible names, and I—” Farrah swallowed hard. “I said I wished he were dead.”
The tightness increased until Blake couldn’t breathe.
“A few days later, we got a call from my uncle. My dad had been dealing with liver cirrhosis for years, but it got worse without my mom looking after him. My uncle called to tell us my dad was in a coma.”
A sense of foreboding fell over Blake.
“A few days later, he died.”
His heart exploded. Farrah radiated so much pain Blake felt it deep within his bones.
He hugged her tight, unable to do anything but hold her and keep the pieces together as she fell apart.
“Can you imagine if the last thing your daughter ever said to you was that she wished you were dead?” The only way Blake knew how much Farrah hurt was by the way her shoulders heaved as she collapsed into silent sobs.
“Shh. It’s ok.” He rubbed her back and pressed his lips to the top of her head, feeling helpless. “It’s ok.”
“I’m a terrible person. No matter what he did, he was my dad and I loved him. And now I’ll—” She hiccupped. “I’ll never get the chance to tell him.”
“He knows.”
Farrah shook her head.
“He does,” Blake insisted. “We’ve all said things we regret out of anger. I’m sure your dad did too. He knew you didn’t mean it. And those were only a few words out of how many you’ve spoken to him throughout your life?” He tilted her chin up. Despite her red nose and swollen eyes, she took his breath away. Her true beauty wasn’t physical; it was in her soul. He saw it shining through in everything she did, and it was as bright and warm as the sun on a summer day. “You’re an incredible person. You would never hurt someone on purpose. This is coming from me, someone who’s known you for three months. Your dad knew you your entire life.”
Farrah’s lips trembled. She nodded once before burying her face in his chest again. Blake sat there, holding her until her sobs slowed.
Once they did, she pulled away and wiped her cheeks dry. “I’m sorry. I ruined your shirt.”
“It’s a stupid shirt. I can buy another one.” Blake brushed away her remaining tears. “How are you feeling?”
“Better.” Farrah sniffled. “I’ve never told anyone what happened with my dad before. Not even my mom.”
Damn. Blake was about to cry himself. Toughen up, man. “Thank you for trusting me.”
She gave him a wobbly smile. “Thank you for trusting me.”
They sat there on their little corner of the wall, each the keeper of the other’s secrets. Their fight in Macau was a faded memory, but one thing from that night remained crystal-clear in Blake’s mind: the look in Farrah’s eyes when he asked why she cared about him and Mina.
Deep down, he knew what she was going to say. He’d interrupted her with a lie because he was too scared to admit what he’d known all along, but after today there was no use denying it: Blake was in love with Farrah. He was in so deep he didn’t have a devil’s chance of getting out, and what’s more, he didn’t want to.
Blake closed his eyes and leaned his head against the wall.
I am so fucked.
