“Come on, Dixie.” I look down at the dog beside me. She’s a mix, I don’t know of what breeds.
Dixie stops for the seventh time to investigate a new smell. I jog in place, waiting for her to be done. I lose patience andstart running, and she catches up when she realizes she’s fallen behind.
My feet kick up gravel as I round a bend in the road. It’s a quiet stretch of land, for the most part. Most of the noise comes from the rental cabin next door. New faces coming and going. I don’t see them much, not with all those trees and space separating the properties, but I pass the place on my way to work and notice the ever-changing vehicles.
Today, there’s a white four-door sedan parked out front. Normally, the cars are SUVs or minivans. Vehicles that accommodate families. The front door to the cabin is propped open. A dog appears in the doorway, and that’s all it takes. Dixie is off.
“Shit,” I mutter, running after her. My calls for her fall on deaf ears. Dixie has a singular goal, and it’s that dog in the doorway barking its head off.
Dixie approaches the home at full speed, and the other dog backs up. The barking has stopped and now its eyes are anxious. If it could talk, it would be saying something likeI’m sorry, I didn’t mean anything by it.
I’m running as fast as I can, but I’m no match for Dixie. She wants a friend, and there will be no stopping her. She races up the stairs and straight into this stranger's home.
I take the stairs two at a time, slowing at the front door. I peek inside. “Hello?” When I don’t see anybody I step inside cautiously. Dixie and the other dog circle one another, sniffing each other’s backsides and establishing a hierarchy.
I look around, but don’t see anybody. Great. I can haul Dixie away and nobody will know. I stride forward into the open area between the living room and the kitchen, where the dogs are wrestling. With any luck, the renters are down at the lake, and I can have us out of here in fewer than ten seconds.
I grab Dixie by the collar. “Come on,” I command, making my voice deep and strict. She ignores me, pulling against my hold.
I stand, frustrated, and run a hand over my face. When the hand is gone, I see movement in the corner of my eye. I turn quickly, hands up in innocence, ready to tell the person I’m just trying to get the dog back.
My words die on my lips.
Avery stands in the kitchen, holding a frying pan out to the side of her body. Her eyes are wide, frozen. AirPods nestle in her ears.
It’s difficult to describe what my heart is doing in this moment. The best word I can think of issobbing. This woman was my world, until I went and ruined it.
Now she’s here, not just here to see her sister’s arch but here, in a cabin, inserted into the tiny slice of solitude and seclusion I’ve carved out for myself. She’s supposed to be in Phoenix, thriving and living her best life.
Her arm lowers, and the frying pan bumps her calf. She removes each AirPod methodically, setting them on the counter with the pan.
She comes closer, stopping a few feet from me. Her chest rises and falls with a slow and quiet exhalation. Her shirt falls open at the top, just enough that I can see the top swell of her breasts. A place I once buried my face, kissed, and slept on. I drowned myself in this woman, and came up for air when I never wanted to.
Now here she is, standing before me. Her eyes are question marks, but she seeks answers I don’t know how to give. How do you explain to someone you demolished their heart not because you didn’t love them, but because you loved them too much?
The dogs, wrestling and growling and playing, bump into my feet. We both look down.
“You have a dog?” I ask, astonished. Unless… My gaze darts around the room. Is she here with Camryn? Or someone else? The thought sits in my stomach like curdled milk.
“Ruby,” she answers. “She’s mine.”
It’s the first time in years I’ve heard Avery speak. She didn’t say a word to me yesterday. She stood in the rain, a statue, except for the pulse throbbing in her throat. Her voice curls into me now, settling back in its familiar spot in my chest the way it once did.
“You didn’t want a dog. Not after…” My voice trails off. She’s giving me a look that saysyou don’t know me anymore.
She’s not wrong.
I point out front. “That’s your car?”
She nods. “My old one died.” Her gaze goes to my head. “You’re wearing your hair longer.”
At her mention of it, I brush it off my forehead. Her hair is shorter than before, up near her collarbone. It used to hang down her back. “You got a haircut.”
Her face muscles twitch like she’s beating back a smirk. “I’ve had several.”
I nod. “Right. Of course.”
Quiet falls over us. What do you say when there is so much to say? Where do you begin, when the hill that looms is really a mountain?
