“I’m not sure what to do about her,” Teagan sighed. “She’s the one who actually needs rehab. But what can I do to help?”
“You know,” Darcy said slowly. “I think it’s pretty cool, actually, that you’re here with her. More families ought to figure out their substance issues together. God knows they’re usually the place people learned them.”
Teagan shook his head. “No, you don’t understand. I don’t do drugs. I’m not an alcoholic.”
“I’ve heard that before,” she replied, patently disbelieving. “Look, you wouldn’t be the first person to bounce onrehab after the first day. But you’ll probably feel better about it if you explain it to your sister, rather than me. What’s she going to say?”
“This was her idea in the first place. She thought we’d just... feel better out here. We haven’t been doing well since our mother died.” It didn’t seem right to use a euphemism likepassed. Her death had been sudden and violent and more disappointing than surprising. And even if his life felt uncontrollable now, that had less to do with her absence in Teagan’s life than his presence in what had been hers.
“Ah, damn. Sorry to hear that,” Darcy said, raising her eyebrows. “No wonder you two are in it. I’d drink alotif one of my parents died, and I haven’t seen them in a long time.”
That sounded like an excuse. Like sympathy he didn’t deserve. It had been two years, and even before her death,closehad been more of a description of their physical proximity than their emotional connection. Teagan shook it off.
“So you don’t think you’ll feel better out here?” Darcy pressed, hands on round hips. “In the most beautiful place in the world, where other people bring your food and clean your room and all you have to do is go to group and pet the horses?”
Teagan wordlessly gestured to his battered self. She tossed her head, still unimpressed, and gave him an insistent look. She was going to make him explain why he was bailing out of rehab, even when he didn’t need it in the first place. He stared down at his feet.
“This just isn’t the right kind of program for me,” he finally said. “The very last thing in the world I would like to do is sit around and think right now. All I can think of is everything else I should be doing back home.”
“You don’t have to go to meditation. Nobody’s gonnamake you,” Darcy said. “If you want to stay too busy to think about the sauce, Rachel’s got all sorts of stuff for you to do.”
“Clearing my toxins with healing crystals?” Teagan said skeptically.
Darcy snorted. “Yeah, no,” she said. “The crystals are bullshit. But it doesn’t really matter what you do, right? It could be anything, as long as you aren’t drinking. And if Rachel can’t find you something you like to do, I will. There’s a whole giant wilderness to play in. You know, you could even help me clear out a different trail to the waterfall, because there’s a fuckingbearon the one we’ve been using.”
He laughed, even though it sent a wave of discomfort through his side.
“Your real agenda is revealed,” he said.
“Yep,” said Darcy, warm brown eyes softer than her words. “In fact, you could say you owe it to me, because this is your fault to begin with, and it wasn’t likeIwas dying of too much free time on my hands.”
He was fairly certain she was joking, since she wasn’t trying to hustle him back into the truck, and her tone was gentle. Teagan scrunched up his face tightly, buffeted by conflicting impulses. His mother couldn’t have done more damage to the foundation if she’d tried, but she hadn’t tried at all when it came to Sloane.
Poor Sloane. Teagan had been so tied up in knots with his work, he hadn’t even noticed her struggling.
He couldn’t leave Sloane out here alone.
“No, you’re right, you’re right,” he told Darcy. “I’m sure my sister’s wondering where I am already.”
Darcy reached out and patted his shoulder again, a gesture that seemed comforting this time. Teagan wanted tolean into the small touch, but he was afraid he’d topple over if he did.
“You’re finally making good choices. I’ll take you back.” She smiled brightly, the pleased expression on her beautiful face the first hopeful thing Teagan had seen in weeks. “We can listen to a podcast on bear country safety on the way.”
six
Group therapy was first thing in the morning to accommodate Dr. Goedert’s practice in Bozeman. It was clear and chilly, and the dew lingered on the grass and wooden Adirondack chairs arranged around the fire pit set a few dozen yards back from the residence. Teagan and the other guests huddled under thick woolen blankets that smelled of woodsmoke, hands clutching steaming paper cups of cinnamon-bark-and-ginger water they were allowed in lieu of caffeinated beverages. This morning, the still thin peace of the scene was punctuated by the drone of the riding mower with which Darcy was cutting the camp’s grass. Teagan’s eyes tracked her as she buzzed from the woods to the lake in long, straight rows.
Hi, Darcy, he began to mentally compose for the next time they spoke.Hi, Darcy, because he hadn’t managed to say anything more intelligent to her in the week since they made mutual acquaintance under the jaws of furry death. He ought to use this time to think of something else he could say to her. Any of the typical things he might say to her afterHi, Darcy—do you want to get a coffee, do you want to get a drink, can I buy you dinner, can I perform normalcy for you—were off the table out in Big Sky. He didn’t know whatcame afterHi, Darcyout here, so all he got back wasHey, Bear Baitand the teasing flip of her ponytail as she kept on walking.
“Do you have anything you’d like to add, Teagan?” Dr. Goedert called.
“No, I’m just thinking,” Teagan replied, which was true, although he was thinking about the curvaceous figure of the woman on the mower, not the group therapy agenda.
He squirmed in his seat, owing as much to the topic as to his stitches, which were scabbed over and starting to itch.
The discussion topic of the day wasfathers, relationship with. Whilefatherswas a slightly less fraught topic thanmothers, in his book at least, Teagan stared down at his bark water and tensed as Sloane’s turn to speak approached.
Group therapy was the only mandatory activity at the retreat, but it was the one he most wished he could opt out of. Everyone else at the wellness retreat was in recovery from some type of substance abuse. Some of them had been very ill; some of them had lost jobs and relationships and children over their struggles. But Teagan had no idea what he could say that could possibly be insightful, and he shifted uncomfortably through every day’s session, trying not to draw attention to himself.
