“Like my parents.”
Dan gave me a surprised look. “Abby and Ash? There must be some reason your dad’s still bunking with me. But I hear him talking in his sleep. He loves your mom.”
I frowned, confused. “Oh.”
“I was talking about me.”
My heart swooped. “You’re married.” Momma tried to tell me. I didn’t really know him at all.
He nodded, holding my gaze. “Was. Before I went to Iraq.”
“I’m sorry. That it didn’t work out, I mean.”
“I’d just joined up. She thought she was marrying a hero. I couldn’t be that for her, so...” He shrugged.
“It’s hard when people expect so much of you,” I said softly.
“Guess she found it someplace else.”
This time the anger felt good. Warranted. “She cheated.”
“Can’t say I blame her.” The calico cat emerged from its nest and twined around his ankles. “I was pretty rough for a while after I got out.”
“Not now,” I said.
“Not so much now.” He reached down to scratch the cat under its chin. “Still get angry sometimes.”
The cat’s purring filled the feed room. A copper-and-ash kitten ventured out of the box, and was promptly pounced on by its siblings.
“I had a fight with my sisters today,” I heard myself say.
Dan continued to pet the cat without comment.
“Not really a fight,” I amended. “They were actually very supportive.”
“Your sisters are good people.”
“They’re wonderful. Which makes it worse. They’re only trying to help. I shouldn’t snap at them.”
He glanced up. “Kind of hard on yourself, aren’t you?”
The shadow rose like the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come, dark and accusing. “I don’t think so.”
Dan straightened. All of his movements were smooth and slow. No wonder he was so good with animals. “Your dad got me going to those meetings of his for a while. You know?”
I made an affirmative noise. My father had lots of meetings in the basement of the church where he’d once served as pastor. Veterans’ support. Grief recovery. Alcoholics Anonymous.
“Yeah. So some of the God talk, that’s not really for me. But a lot of it made sense. Everybody’s got their own shit to deal with. The first step is, you need to accept that you’ve got shit. You’ve got to want to fix your shit. And then you have to accept that you can’t fix your shit without help.”
The darkness inside me seethed. My personal shadow. Could I let it go? Did I want to?
“You think I need help?”
He was silent. Leaving the answer, the decision, up to me.
I liked him so much. I wanted to get to know him. But I was afraid to let him know me. The real me, with my darkness and my flaws.
Jo’s question to Amy came back to me.“The question is, What do you want?”
