Her brother had always been able to put things simply. He had a knack for finding the bullseye, for pointing out exactly what it was that Sammie didn’t want to look at.
She’d expected tears to fill this conversation, much as they had her reconciliation with Ivy. The grief was there, of course it was there. But it was overshadowed by a cresting relief that Sammie hadn’t seen coming. A weight lifted in a moment, carried off on the gentle breeze.
“The realtor I’m talking to,” she continued, finally kicking her feet into the dirt, pushing herself into the air. “She said I should still finish up some of the repairs. She thinks I could make more off the house doing that than trying to sell as-is.”
Atticus nodded, pushing with his heel to swing opposite her. “Let me and Kai help with the costs.”
Sammie bit back the same tired excuses she’s been throwing at him for the last three years. She’d never once allowed Atticus to spend anything on the old house, because he hadn’t wanted to keep it in the first place.
But maybe, sometimes, it was okay to let others help carry the burden.
“Okay.”
Atticus whipped his head toward her, nearly unseating himself with the motion. Sammie snorted as he caught himself, barely managing to keep from falling out of the swing. “Don’t be dramatic.”
“Sorry if the fact that you’reallowing someone to help youtook me by surprise, but I don’t think I’ve even witnessed this first hand before.” He stuck his tongue out, and she matched his expression, earning a chuckle. “You sure this is what you want?”
His question caught her off guard. Sammie had thought she would tell him about the decision and that would be the end of it. But she should have known better. Atticus never had been one to let things remain unspoken.
“It is,” she said, not meeting his stare. Instead, she closed her eyes, extending her arms to lean back as she swung through the air. “It hurts, but like you said, letting it go doesn’t take away the memories.” She paused, weighing her next words. The ones she’d rarely given voice to even in her own mind. “I think I should have let it go a long time ago. But a part of me thought that if I held on tight enough, it would be like hitting pause on all the things I ran out of time to say.”
Atticus was quiet for a long while, giving Sammie a chance to process her own confession. The house, and all the things in it, were the last physical ties to their grandma. The restaurant was gone. Greta was gone. All that remained was the place where she’d raised them, and all of the memories that faded a little more with each passing day.
“Can I show you something?”
Sammie hadn’t expected to be met with a question. She opened her eyes to see that Atticus had once more stopped swinging as he tugged his wallet out of his back pocket. He opened it, carefully pulling out a slip of paper that was worn, wrinkled as if it had been folded and unfolded many times.
“Here.” Atticus passed her the slip of paper. It was soft in her hands, and Sammie unfolded it carefully. It was plain, unlined, and small. The size of a notepad kept for jotting down messages, like the ones seen in an office.
Or in a hospital.
“You had gone home to get some sleep,” Atticus said. Sammie’s eyes were glued on the little page. “It was just a few hours before I had to call you to come back, before she… before she was unresponsive.”
Four words faded on the page.
I loveyou, always.
Four scrawled words. One underlined. There was a desperation to the scribbled line, and Sammie could picture the hurried motion that might have accompanied it.
The tears finally came, stinging her nose and pricking at her eyes.
“What did she mean?” Because there was more to the note than the simple sentiment that they’d heard from their grandma thousands of times. She looked up to see Atticus shrugging, his bright eyes misty enough to match her own.
“We hadn’t been talking about anything in particular.” He hesitated, swallowing thickly. “She’d been asleep one minute, and the next she was tapping me on the shoulder and gesturing for a pen.” Greta had been on a ventilator at the end, her lungs finally beginning to fail her. “She wrote that and then pushed it into my hand. She was gone a few hours later.”
A battle was playing out within Sammie, too many big emotions vying for purchase. Grief, never ending grief that always stabbed harder whenever she thought it might subside. A strange jealousy that she resented, that she didn’t want, but why hadn’t Greta left her a note as well?
Hope was there, too.
“I don’t know what exactly she was trying to tell me,” her brother continued. He sounded so strong, not even the slightest waver to his words. Sammie had always sort of seen him as someone to be protected, but he didn’t need that from her anymore, did he? The realization slammed into her as Atticus continued. “But I choose to believe she was being intentional.” He leaned over, pointing out the underlined word. “She was saying she lovedme. Not who she wanted me to be, not who she thought Ishouldbe. Just me, exactly as I am.”
Sammie’s hands shook as she held the delicate pages. The folds were nearly worn through, evidence of the strength her brother took from seeing those words written out. Proof ofsomething Sammie had never once allowed herself to truly hope for.
Atticus reached up, ruffling her hair. “If she loved me like that, it means she loved you like that, too. Even the parts of you that she never got to see.”
Maybe it was something about those swings. Maybe it was that she finally had so many people in her life that made her feel safe, that made it okay for her to let go and feel anything and everything that she needed to feel. Atticus had always been there, steadfast and smiling. But now she had more support than she knew what to do with. Ivy, Kai. Zehra. Luz, and apparently even Carson.
Kieran.
