“You haven’t been hungry in a week, sweetheart.” She placed the casserole on the dining table, which was now clean because she’d spruced up the place a couple of times. Did the dirty dishes in the kitchen, brought me meat and produce that I didn’t touch, let the maids in so they could change my linens and keep the place…habitable.
I’d hardly left this couch, sitting in the corner of it and becoming one with the fabric. “It’s only been a week?” It felt like a month. Every night I slept, I dreamed Callum was there with me, looking at me with that tear-soaked face.
I’d never loved someone so much and despised them at the same time.
“Why don’t we go into the village and have dinner?”
“Ugh. No.”
“You need to eat, Lily,” she said more sternly. “You don’t want your body to atrophy the way your father’s did.”
“Not really the same thing.”
She came around the couch to give me that hard stare. “Maybe not to you, but it is to the rest of us.”
I sighed. “Guess that’s fair.”
“Come on, I’ll set the table.” She left my sight to get to work in the kitchen, to put two plates on the surface and some utensils.
I showered once every few days but wore the same casual clothes around the house. I still had one of the shirts Callum used to wear all the time, but I couldn’t bring myself to either wear it or toss it out.
She served the casserole onto my plate, the sweet potatoes mixed with the crunch of pecans and brown sugar.
I took a bite and loved the flavor, but my appetite never came. We ate in silence, and my mind drifted somewhere else as if my mother wasn’t even there. “Do you know how he’s doing?” I didn’t even know where he was. I didn’t know where he slept at night. He hadn’t tried to come see me, and I hadn’t tried to contact him.
“I think the same as you, sweetheart.”
I felt bad, like I was the one who’d caused all this pain when I hadn’t. “You think? Or you know?”
“Your father stopped by to see him. Described him as…an empty vessel.”
Was I the worst person in the world to be comforted by his misery? That I wasn’t crazy for being out-of-my-mind depressed? “Where is he?”
“He was staying at an inn in the village.”
“I’m glad he’s okay.”
“Your father gifted him a piece of land. One of the vineyards that’s started to fall into disrepair since there’s no heir to claim it.”
“Callum?” I asked in slight surprise.
“I was just as surprised.”
“I expected Dad to yell at him, not gift him property.”
“I think your dad has taken a liking to him, although he’s never shared why.”
I turned back to the casserole and took a few more bites.
“You don’t see it working, sweetheart?”
Tears welled in my eyes when I thought about it. “I—I don’t know. I still love him…obviously. But this isn’t about love. It’s about forgiveness. And I’m not sure if I can forgive him for all the pain, destruction, and suffering he caused. Just knowing Dad almost died because of him makes it hard to look at him.”
My brother dragged me outside, almost literally, and forced me onto a bench under the oak tree. “There. Not so bad, right?” He sat beside me and pointed into the distance. “Look at that view. Never gets old.”
Sunrises and sunsets meant nothing to me nowadays.
Hawk sat there with me in silence, just existing with me, like getting me out of the house was the win. “Doing okay? Mom said you downed that casserole pretty hard.”
