There’s a folder tucked in the end table by the recliner.I reach for it after cleaning the surface and let a tear fall as letters of mine, worn soft at the crease, topple out onto the floor.I got to my knees to collect them, the top one from an orchard where the blossoms came late; the edges darkened from being opened and re-folded.
Hedidlook.
He looked in the way he knew how, quiet, steady, alone.It doesn’t excuse anything, and it doesn’t need to.It just loosens something in my chest I didn’t realize had cinched tight.
I stay there on the floor, my back to dad's chair.The letters in my lap, watching the fire dance in the fireplace.I let myself feel it all.
I know what ifs won't solve anything.I know we can't turn back time.But it still stings that we both wanted the same thing and will never get a chance to have it.
By Sunday, I have to head back to Summit City.Anatomy practical on Monday, four a.m.barn call Tuesday.Before I leave, I drive into town.The road in is rutted; the river runs fast with melt.The café bell at Clara’s announces my arrival when I push in, and the room smells like cinnamon and coffee and something yeasty in the oven that’s about to be perfect.
Judy waves me over to a table already half-claimed by stories.I get introduced to everyone as I join, and more follow.Diane sits beside Judy, blonde hair tucked behind one ear, clear blue eyes that are kind in a way you can't fake.A few minutes later, Dean and Dr.Morgan join us, Robert shrugging out of a jacket that smells faintly like aftershave and antiseptic.
They ask about school, and I tell them the truth: there’s a desperate need for vet techs everywhere, but especially out in rural areas; I’m a year in, maybe a year and change if I tack on specialized courses; I like the work.I like being useful.I like getting to work with animals all day.
“You’d never be empty of work here,” Dean says.“Horses, cattle, every dog that likes to eat things it shouldn’t.”
Clara breezes by with a tray, blonde hair knotted up, smile bright enough to qualify as morning.“Top off?”she asks, already pouring.A little voice calls for her from the back, and she says, “Jackson!Aunt Cass will be here to get you soon, buddy,” and she’s gone again.
Judy beams as she talks about her boys.“Adam’ was working kitchens across Canada, but he came back about a year ago and opened a farm-to-table pub that includes so many local farms and makers.Brody is back from Vancouver and has been helping out with...well, just about everything.”
Diane fills in the Morgan tree with the ease of someone who has told these stories so many times they have become permanent.“Chase is home and has joined Robert at the practice.Clara, whom you've met, runs this place, and Cassidy...”she pauses, a concerned yet fond look on her face.“She is back home too, working on a book.”
They tell me about another couple they wanted me to meet, John and Maggie Carson.They own a ranch about 20 minutes outside of town.Judy tells me I have to go to Adam's to try the beef the Carson’s ranch provides, before mentioning they have three children as well, Eli, who Judy says was born a few days before Adam, Nate, who is a big-time hockey player in Summit City and their youngest, a daughter named Kenzie, who is still in school just like me.
I ask if anyone knows a good mechanic who won’t laugh when I say I want to keep an old blue Chevy alive.Dean writes down a name and a number and says he’ll swing by to check on the place while I’m gone.Robert offers to keep a spare key at the clinic, just in case someone needs to access the place.
They try to convince me I fit here, and I don’t push back because I don’t feel pushed.I just tucked it away with the other things I am working through right now.
“I’ll think about it,” I say, which is as honest as I can be right now.“I have to finish school first.”
Diane mentions a fundraiser event that is coming up at Adam's that I should come to, a great way to catch up with the kids I played with when I was little.
When I drive out of Hawthorne Ridge, the road throws slush up the sides of my car, and the sky is the same pale blue as that Chevy under the tarp.I don’t make promises I can't keep.I make plans and lists and show up where I’m needed.
But as the fields pull away behind me, something small and stubborn settles in the space just under my ribs.
Not homesickness.
A knowing.
Like soil deciding, finally, that it’s time to thaw.
Chapter 4 - Nate
1 Year Ago
We should still be playing hockey.
Instead, the season’s dead and the sun’s too bright.
First-round exit.The kind that leaves a mark you can’t tape over.Everyone says,You’ll get ’em next year,but nobody means it.Not when the captain’s supposed to carry the team past round one.Not when the city’s already switched its loyalty to something else for the summer.
Brielle didn’t want to stay home and sulk through the off-season.“Somewhere hot,” she said, “somewhere where it matters to be seen.”
So we flew south with two of my teammates and their girlfriends, half hockey, half social-media royalty.Brielle hates being called an influencer now.She saysbrand architectlike it’s a degree.
I’m at the pool bar when she appears in a tiny bikini, oversized hat, sunglasses big enough to hide behind.The world stops breathing for a second before it exhales again.
