“I’m so, so sorry.”
“Stop.” Boone dropped his hand heavily onto my knee. “Family doesn’t apologize.”
“I should’ve been paying more attention. The light had been on since this morning.”
“It’s no problem, Mallory. Honestly. It’ll be fine to leave it overnight where you parked it. I’ll come back with Sharon in the morning to get it and I’ll bring a gallon of gas, too.” He stroked his beard and switched his focus forward through the windshield. It was dark out now, the sun finally sliding from the sky. Lights flickered on at establishments that dotted the road as we passed, their illuminated colors an amber blur spread across my window. I let it lull me as the car rocked down the highway.
“So, are we going to talk about the tears?” Boone asked. “I’m not good with the emotional stuff, but I can sure try.”
I sunk into the passenger seat of the truck. There were cracks from the wear of time that spliced the leather and I curled my finger into one that had tufts of stuffing popping from it. It didn’t distract me the way I hoped, though. “I feel like I’ve just seen a ghost.”
“I feel that way a lot about Dylan.”
“Oh. No.” What an insensitive thing for me to say. I felt like an idiot. Of course it should be Dylan I was talking about. Dylan I was thinking of. “Just an old friend.”
“Of the boy variety?”
I smiled without meaning to. “Yes, an old boyfriend.”
“And you weren’t expecting to see him.” The truck swung wide around the corner and the Quinn house came into view at the edge of a court. I’d be staying there tonight, which was one part comforting and one part confusing. I didn’t want to be in a place that reminded me so much of my husband when I had thoughts of someone who wasn’t him. It wasn’t rational, of that I was well aware, but emotions rarely were.
“I honestly never thought I’d see him again.”
“Are you glad to have seen him?”
I bit my lip to tuck back the tremble. I only answered with a small nod.
Boone’s eyes met mine. “Then I’m very glad you saw him, sweetheart. So very glad.”
I needed that more than anything. I needed permission to feel again because on my own I didn’t know that I’d ever allow it. To feel anything other than the loss.
“Thank you, Boone,” I said as we pulled into the driveway and parked. I climbed down from the truck and shut its door. “For everything.”
“This is not the sort of thing you need to thank me for. I’m your dad. I’m happy that I get to come to your rescue.”
He held the front door open to allow me to step inside once we got to the house. The lights were off downstairs, all but the glow of the baby monitor in the kitchen that flickered in a rainbow arch from Sharon’s singing voice as she lullabied my boy to sleep.
“Sounds like our little munchkin is just getting to bed,” Boone acknowledged, his eyebrows waggling my direction. “I know you’d probably like to go tuck him in, but do you think it would be all right if Sharon settles him down first? I have to admit, she was quite excited to hear that he’d be spending the night. That little man has her wrapped around his tiny, sticky finger.”
“Of course. In fact, she can do the honors tonight.” I rubbed the back of my neck. “I actually might have spent the other night with him all snuggled in my arms in our rocker, so I think it’s definitely Grandma’s turn.”
Boone gave me a hug before he headed to bed and even though I wanted to slouch into his arms, I tensed. If I let myself really feel it, I’d lose it. I didn’t want to lose it again tonight.
The hallway was long and I shuffled my way down it. Pictures varying in size and frame dotted the walls but I didn’t look at them. I’d seen them all a million times. So many were of my husband, youthful and vibrant. He was the star quarterback at Whitney High and there was no shortage of recognition for his performance here. It was practically a Hall of Fame.
I tugged on the door handle to his room and entered. It was quiet. Of course it was quiet. It didn’t smell like him, either, and I knew that, but I still took a deep, lung-filling breath. If anything, it was musty and dank. There were cleats and trophies and leather footballs on shelves and his varsity jacket pinned to the wall, all flat and stretched out, missing any form. I didn’t know him then and in a way, it made it easier to be here—surrounded by so many of his things and memories that didn’t involve me—than it was to be at home where his absence in our life was so noticeably strong.
I peeled back the covers on the twin-size bed as I toed off my shoes and slipped my jeans from my hips, tossing my purse to the nightstand before doing so. My shirt would have to do for pajamas. I knew I could rummage through his dresser and find an old, worn t-shirt, but I didn’t do it. Moving on from my husband was not made any easier when I wore his clothes.
The Quinn’s used this as a spare bedroom, so there was a weird comfort in the fact that it wasn’t just Dylan’s space anymore, like some shrine to him. I slumped onto the mattress and the pillow wrapped softly around my head. My body was tired and welcomed the promise of rest.
Many times when I lay here, I thought of what Dylan was like as a teenage boy, if he would’ve been someone I would have been interested in or even dated.
But my heart wasn’t available then.
It belonged to Heath McBride.
Our encounter tonight at Caroline’s studio must’ve been the reason for the phrase, “What are the chances?” I’d thought about him often over the years, less in the current ones, but still, there was always a piece of me that held on to him, on to what we had. It wasn’t an easy love to let go.
And he looked so good tonight. Amazing, actually. The dimples that won me over the first time I laid eyes on him were even more appealing now on the face of man. They pricked deeply into his cheeks when he smiled at me, his grin wide and warm. There were times when I’d thought about what he might look like all grown up, but I never let myself dwell on it.
I was dwelling now. Completely dwelling.
Dwelling so much that I felt the stupid smile sneaking onto my mouth. I pulled the pillow out from under my head and smothered my face with it, trying not to giggle.
The thought of Heath’s dimpled face made me giggle. I was certifiably crazy.
I was about to scold myself, tell myself what a senseless woman I was that I was in my dead husband’s teenage room, thinking of my old teenage boyfriend when I registered a low buzz coming from deep inside my purse. It pulsed once more after few moments of going unchecked. I’d gotten texts before, thousands of them, but my heart raced at this sound like it was unfamiliar and unknown.
“It could be anybody,” I actually said aloud.
I didn’t want it to be just anybody.
Five minutes lapsed and my willpower was no match for my curiosity.
I pinched my eyes shut while I dug my phone out and held it in my palm. When it pulsed another time, I threw it across the room, the grenade launched from me with force.
“Good grief, Mallory!” I trudged to where my phone landed on the carpet. It should’ve been cracked across the screen, but the rug cushioned its fall. “You are absolutely ridiculous, you know that, woman?”
Crouching, I folded my legs up underneath me and slid right down into the middle of Dylan’s room, staring at the words on my phone’s screen.
Heath: Hi.
And then a second text, longer than the first.
Heath: This is probably none of my business, but are you married, Mallory?
My shoulders bounced with the unanticipated laugh that elicited.
Me: No, not married.
I fired off the text and then seconds later added, Are you?
Waiting for the returned message was more challenging than waiting on a pot of water to boil. The longer I stared at the device, the more certain I was that the answer would be one I didn’t wish to see. It only required a yes or no, but there was an explanation here and I was impatient and expectant for it.
Heath: Me neither, but it’s complicated.
Me: I’m fluent in complicated.
Heath: LOL
I cringed. That was teenager speak, something I most definitely was not fluent in.
You couldn’t really end a text on an LOL. It just wasn’t possible. The other person would always wait for another, more adequate response, some way to finalize and button up the conversation with full words rather than abbreviations. I was doing just that as the phone buzzed again.
Heath: If you don’t have plans this Tuesday, I have two incredibly hard to get, super sought after tickets for one of the most highly anticipated events of the year. I’d love to offer one to you.
My cheeks flushed and there was a welcome enthusiasm from that invitation that did strange things to my belly.
Me: You’ve got me curious. Where to?
Heath: My ten-year-old niece’s dance recital.
A laugh leaped from my throat.
Me: Sounds fantastic.
Heath: Really? I might have played it up slightly.
Twelve years. Twelve years without any communication and we slipped right into this easy banter so effortlessly. How was that even possible?
Me: What time should I be ready?
Heath: I would love to say right now, but I suppose 6:00 on Tuesday will do.
Me: I can’t wait.
I stared at the phone for a heavy pause when he finally answered.
Heath: I guess we’ll only have to wait a little longer.
Those words were dense with meaning. Not definitions, but emotion and story. One sentence that, to anyone else, would be easily skimmed over and forgotten. But there was something weighty in his words, and I felt it. Nerves rattled around in my heart, the one he’d owned so fully when we were kids.
The one a piece of him probably still owned.
But the one that had also been burst into a million other pieces, some pieces that I didn’t even have anymore. Some pieces that someone else would always have and some pieces that were gone forever.
But maybe, maybe there were pieces that I could try to get back.
I smiled to myself and shut my phone off for the night.
