“This’s really not fair,” I accuse. “How am I supposed to stay strong when faced withthat?”
Kate chuckles as she gives me the tiniest shove forward. “Good luck.”
The second I take a step toward him, relief washes over his face. Stealing myself against the desire to comfort him, I brush past him in total silence, headed toward his little makeshift picnic.
He’s put some effort into this. There’s a soft blanket to sit on, some fruit and cheese and crackers set out under a protective cover to keep bugs away.
“You, uh, want something cold to drink?” he offers hesitantly as I drop my pack and flop down onto the blanket. I’m acting like a petulant child instead of the grown-ass woman I am. Truth is, I’m just as uncomfortable as he is,and this passive-aggressive attitude isn’t doing either of us any favors.
“No thank you. What is it you want to say?” There. That ought to throw him for a loop. If I know Jackson, he’s going to sweet-talk around the problems he’s caused and then hightail it to some other new adventure. Despite Kate’s assurance that he’s back for good, I don’t trust it.
He takes a deep breath and drops to his knees, facing me. “I want to say that I’m sorry. I’m so fucking sorry.”
Of course he is. It’s written all over his face. I cross my arms over my chest to bolster my strength. “What, exactly, are you sorry for?”
His jaw works, and I brace myself for the shortest apology in history.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Jackson
Damn. I felt like shit before now, but the way she’s all closed off is almost frightening. I try to take her hand, but she pulls away, like she doesn’t want anything to do with me. Anxiety tightens my chest, making it hard to breathe.
The simple apology I’d planned while I waited for her and Kate to show up isn’t going to be enough to ease any of her pain. The heartbreak I’ve put her through is written all over her face, in the coldness she’s emanating. Hell, she’ll barely even look at me.
I let her question roll through me. What am I sorry for?
“Everything.”
She huffs a little and shakes her head. I’m losing, and I haven’t really even started.
Seconds pass by like hours, and she shifts like she’s going to get up.
“Wait. Please,” I beg. “I’m trying to find the rightwords.”
I shift off my knees, wishing I could take her hand. This would be so much easier if she’d just let me touch her. Without her, everything feels in limbo. She’s stable; she grounds me.
“I should’ve told you the minute I realized you knew T.J.” That stops her and has that cold gaze interested in me now. It bolsters me enough to keep going. “I was afraid if I told you, if I brought up the night he died, you’d hate me, and we’d just shared the best night of my life. I didn’t want to ruin it. And then that stupid video at the reunion brought everything back, and I just couldn’t face it. I figured once you knew the truth, you’d hate me anyway, so I just… ran.”
Around us, birds are chirping and squirrels are playing, like my whole world doesn’t hinge on this conversation. In the pond behind us, a fish jumps, the splash of water making us both flinch. I shift around to look, putting me closer to her, both of us facing the water now. Our shoulders are brushing, and I’m that much closer to touching her in earnest, so I soak in as much of her warmth as possible. “But I don’t want to run anymore.”
As soon as I say the words, I realize what it’s going to take to get her to really understand.
I drop my arm over a propped knee. I’m facing the water, but instead of seeing the small pond in the bright sunlight, I’m taken back to that night. To a clandestine teenage gathering. To midnight waters and teenage voices. To another splash that should have been just the same as the others but was somehow different.
“T.J. was worried about jumping that night. We’d been friends ever since he helped tutor me at the beginning of our senior year. I was this dumb jock, and he was this genius kid. I respected him. He was smart enough to get into thetop schools, but all he ever talked about was this dream of being a firefighter.”
I pluck a blade of grass and run it through my fingers. I haven’t faced any of this in a decade, don’t want to open up now, but I want Maggie in my life more than I want to hold this secret.
“He was nervous but wanted to make the jump. I told him I’d wait for him at the bottom and assured him he’d be fine. But he wasn’t.” Fuck, but it hurts to own this reality. My throat grows uncomfortably tight, and it’s fucking hard to breathe.
Maggie shifts beside me, her shoulder leaning ever so slightly into mine. Lending me her strength even when I don’t deserve it. I don’t deserve her. But she hasn’t left me sitting here alone, and it’s enough to keep going.
“I pulled him out of that water, but I was too late.” I swallow thickly.
My body remembers every second of that night. The frigid water. Hands clamping around a limp arm. Hauling him up that embankment took every ounce of strength I’d possessed. The way he didn’t respond to CPR, even though I’d kept trying until an ambulance arrived. “He’d broken his neck in the fall, had to have landed exactly right or some shit. But I tried so fucking hard to save him. People were screaming, but I didn’t stop until the medics pulled me off him.” Jesus Christ, my eyes are watering, and my voice is wobbling so badly it’s a wonder if she can understand a word I’m saying. I have to clear my throat to continue.
“Anyway, I’d had no plans of my own, really. My grades were shit, so college wasn’t an option. The only reason I would’ve gone was to play ball. But after T.J. died, I decided that since he couldn’t follow his dream, I owed it to him to follow his.”
