Braden was my first love. I’d fallen for him in high school, at the beginning of grade ten. He’d been just a little dangerous and reckless, that cocky, self-assured grin daring me to give him a chance. I’d given him every piece of myself so completely and so willingly.
Our chemistry had always been explosive; he had never been able to keep his hands off my body. When Braden wanted me, he found a way to have me. He was intense, passionate, and temperamental, but he also loved me so completely, in a way that made everything else pale in comparison.
It took a while for him to let me in, but once he did…I truly thought I’d found my forever. It was an incredible, all-encompassing thing to be loved by Braden.
Everything changed when his mom got sick. Something in him broke. I tried to be there for him, but he wouldn’t let me. He pushed me away and he broke my heart in the process.
I’d spent years trying to understand, trying to forgive so that I could move on. I was almost there, too, but then Tessa announced her engagement and the dreams started. I would dream of Braden’s touch and wake up craving his hands on my skin. Nothing satisfied this primal need, and these dreams left me in a perpetual state of wanton frustration. I tried so hard to forget the dreams, but they started leaking into my conscious thoughts too.
Sometimes, I wondered if I threw myself into a relationship with Alex to escape those visions. Actually, that was a lie. I knew I did—I dove in because I was afraid of being alone. I wanted a dependable, functional relationship. I wanted to feel like I had finally moved on.
And it worked, for a while at least. I enjoyed spending time with Alex, I loved that I had strong arms to hold me tight in the night…but then, my life changed and I became acutely aware that something was missing. Haunted with a perpetual loop of all of my life’s worst moments, I started to compare every word, every touch, every action. And I would hate myself for it. Alex was a good man, he cared about me and he’d never hurt me, and yet I was aching for the man that had destroyed my tender heart, a man I hadn’t seen in years—save for once at the announcement dinner.
All he did that night was stare at me. He gave no apologizes, no words were spoken.
I pushed Braden from my mind as I turned onto the old dusty driveway that led up to the small farmhouse I’d grown up in.
It hadn’t been a working farm in decades, not like the farm Tessa had grown up on down the lane. Like the Armstrong’s farm, our farm had been in my mom’s family for centuries. When my maternal grandparents passed away, they left the house and land to my mom. Mom knew her way around the farm and how to run it, but it was a lot of land to upkeep so she ended up renting out fields to Tessa’s dad.
We’d never had animals, except for a couple of cats and a dog when I was little, but this house held a lot of happy memories for me. It sucked that a lot of them included Braden, but I was going to need to get over that…somehow.
Mom came down the front porch steps as I pulled up. I’d barely killed the ignition before she was opening my door and pulling me out for a huge hug. “Elle,” she said into my hair. “Look at how skinny you are! Are you still eating that Mr. Noodles crap?”
“Not all the time,” I laughed. “I’ve just got a job that constantly keeps me on my feet and running.” As soon as the words fell out of my mouth, I regretted them. I still hadn’t been able to tell her.
“That you do,” Mom’s eyes narrowed at the reminder of my job.
She constantly worried about me and my chosen profession, even if she never verbalized her worries. Her method of coping was to redirect conversation away from it. It was exactly why I hadn’t been able to tell her about the struggles I’d faced lately. I didn’t want to justify her worries. I didn’t want her thinking any less of me for not being able to handle it.
“Well, come on in. I’ve got lunch set out. I take it that Tessa will be commandeering your attentions soon?”
“I’m surprised she isn’t here already,” I remarked, following Mom up the worn wooden steps. I purposely avoided looking at the old porch swing. Braden and I had spent many nights curled up on it, star gazing and kissing and talking about the future. “She’s been calling me every day in a panic.”
“Planning a wedding isn’t fun,” Mom chuckled, shaking her head.
My mother had been married once, a long time ago. Twenty-two years ago, to be exact, to the man who had fathered me. He’d left shortly after I was born, after realizing that the domestic family life just wasn’t his cup of tea. I hadn’t heard from him since, and neither had Mom. I really don’t know if she searched for him, after he left. We never spoke about it.
My mom was strong, vibrant, and independent…but I couldn’t help but wonder how deep her scars were, even if she insisted she was happy.
I bit my lip, holding back the questions I had. Now wasn’t the time to get into such a heavy discussion. Instead, I pulled my hair away from the nape of my neck. My skin was already sticky with sweat from the late June heat.
“I know. I have to help her meet with the florist and the baker to make sure that everything is the way Tessa wants it to be,” I said.
She’d narrowed down her selections a lot during the last several months, but was still incredibly indecisive. Tessa was pretty lax, but this wedding stuff was driving her crazy and she couldn’t wait for it to be over. In hindsight, I couldn’t either…although I worried what would be next for me. Helping Tessa was a welcome distraction from dealing with the mess I’d made of my work and personal life.
“Plus the Parry Sound Stampede is coming up,” Mom reminded me with a wink.
“Oh shit,” I frowned.
“Language,” she warned me, arching a brow as she led the way into the kitchen.
“Sorry Mom,” I sighed, my eyes taking in everything around me. Nothing had changed. Everything was still in the same place it had always been. It was like stepping back in time.
I hoped that not everything in this town felt that way.
* * *
After finishing lunch with Mom, I headed upstairs to my old bedroom to unpack. I wasn’t expecting to be hit with such nostalgia. I’d been home since the break-up, of course. Mom and I still went to the Armstrongs’ for Christmas dinner, as we had for years, and my bedroom always felt like a time capsule but this time…it felt different. More torturous and forlorn.
