I need my field.
Unable to hear the noise around me, I take one more look at Maverick before shaking my head again.
And then in this moment.
Thirteen years afterhedid.
I’mthe one who’s walking away.
I just don’t know if it’s for good this time.
Thirty-seven
Maverick
The look on her face, hasn’t stopped haunting me since Saturday. The same look after she learned the truth. All these years wasted because of someone trying to ruin something real.
“Why didn’t you?” her questions replaying constantly in my head.
Why didn’t I?
I’ve been suffering in silence for that answer.
After my dad turned up at my door that one random Friday afternoon, after learning that none of it wastrue, I did my best to try and press further about her, but my dad was tight lipped and wouldn’t even share the colour of her hair to me.
Jake wouldn’t either.
I took this as she’d moved on, found someone else to love and who treated her right. It’s just absolute bullshit that upon learning that wasn’t the case when I returned.
I haven’t seen her since Saturday; I went to work on Monday morning and was placed on barn duty by my best friend who’s also refusing to look at me.
Looking into my whiskey glass, it’s been four days since I last laid my eyes on her, four days of hearing her scream that first night I came home, and her heartbroken stance at the weekend.
On what should have been an amazing day.
Almost was, an amazing day.
Weekdays were always different in McCoy’s. Quiet, with only a few patrons to fill their glasses with the poison they choose to drink.
Those same weekdays once upon a time, are the same weekdays now. A few cowboy’s and old timers, nursing their glasses.
And yet here I am, a reinstated cowboy, nursing my own glass, trying to drown my sorrows, hiding in this bar like the rest of them.
My fingers line the top of my glass of whiskey, even this fucking drink reminds me of her.
It’s her favourite.
I’ve tried to see her, to talk to her.
As far as I can see, she’s locked herself up tight in that big ass ranch of hers. Even being on barn duty, I prayed I’d catch just only a glance at her, even if it was the wind moving her hair; just to give me a sign.
Colter’s refusing to look at me and my mama is struggling to come to terms with the fact that my dad and I never told her the reason of why I refused to come home, until now. So much hurt could have been avoided.
I’ve seen her around home, but again the same heartbroken expression meets me whenever I see her.
I feel even worse for putting my dad in that position, him and mama have been together since they were young, like Hope and Luke, my second parents and what me and Mabel should have been.
Before the sting of salt runs once again down my cheek, I feel a tap on my shoulder. Mack meets my gaze from across the bar. “Another?” he asks, nodding down to my glass. “Please,” I respond,knocking back the harsh liquid down my throat.
