But the forest doesn’t wait for us.
It creeps back in as our breathing slows, the breeze stirring the trees again, and the crickets picking up where they left off.
As I slide out of Cade’s ass and he turns to me, I grab the back of his head and crash my mouth into his. My tongue slides against his as I kiss him like I’m trying to taste the moan I left in his throat. He opens for me, still wrecked and breathless, and I take all of it. Because he’s fuckingmine.
The forest may be calm… but we’re still fucking burning.
FOURTEEN
I need a fucking nap.
The buzz of Dad’s chainsaw cuts through the air like nails on a fucking chalkboard, every slice of the blade through wood sending a fresh wave of irritation through my already frayed nerves. I grab another log and toss it onto the pile, stifling my third yawn in five minutes. I’m running on two hours of sleep, and this is hour four of splitting and hauling firewood. Combine that with the almost two-hour drive here from Fredericton, and I’m barely functioning.
“You’re working too hard,” Dad calls out as he kills the chainsaw and sets it aside.
I eye him as I grab a few more logs, knowing for a fact that’s not true. I’m dragging my ass today.
“Not this,” he adds, waving vaguely in my general direction. “It’s pretty sad when a seventy-year-old can outwork his fit thirty-two-year-old son.” He bends down to grab some logs and winks at me. “But you seem tired, and we don’t see you much. I’m worried you might be over-exerting yourself.”
Guilt rises as I stack a log on the pile. He’s not wrong. I haven’t been around much lately, and the only reason I’m here now is because I knew Dad was going to try to cut all these fallentrees on his own. And yes, I’ve been working a lot, but I haven’t been so busy I couldn’t make time. I just… didn’t. The weekends have started to blur together as I spend them at home, alone, with a bottle in hand. And that has been feeling easier than facing anyone or anything.
“Yeah.” I nod, avoiding his eyes as I grab another log. “I’ve been making progress with my research, and my doctoral student is publishing this month. I’ve been busy.”
Dad’s quiet for a moment, and when I slide my gaze to his, the guilt digs in deeper.
He’s smiling at me—fully lit up with quiet, earnest pride.
If he knew the truth, he wouldn’t be smiling right now.
Because what I do with my life is nothing to be proud of.
But I force a smile back at him, hating that I’ve lost count of the number of lies I’ve told just today.
“So, last time we talked about your research, you were looking into entropy something… in closed systems?” Dad asks, piling some logs into his arms. “Where are we at now?”
I watch him for a moment as he stacks the logs. Dad has always been a hands-on guy in every area of his life. He's an electrician by trade, and even now that he’s retired, he’s still the first to jump in and build or fix something, and help wherever he can. And with me, this is how he shows up. He’s never studied physics formally, but he reads every paper I publish. Not because he loves the subject… I know he doesn’t understand most of it. But because it’s mine. It’s his way of staying close and having something to talk to me about, even when I don’t give him much to work with.
I nod, stepping forward again to stack more logs. “I’m working on entropy production in open quantum systems. Trying to isolate the energy cost of erasing information at small scales and running simulations to see how entropy shifts when quantum processes aren’t perfectly reversible.”
Dad nods slowly. “Ah, yes. I remember you talking about this. Something about disappearing particles, right?”
I cock an eyebrow at him, surprised he remembered that. “Kind of… It’s about the cost of making them disappear, and what that tells us about the system.”
“Ah.” He rolls his eyes and taps his temple with a smirk. “Obviously. Should’ve known.”
I huff a quiet laugh and bend to grab the last of the logs.
“And… everything else?” Dad asks.
I pause, closing my eyes with a subtle sigh before I stand up straight again and slap on a smile. “Great.”
But I can tell he doesn’t buy it. He eyes me for a moment before a soft, sad smile touches his lips. “Good.”
Another sigh escapes me as I turn to the woodpile and slowly stack the logs as silence stretches between us, heavy with words left unsaid.
My eyes drift across the yard, searching for something to hold on to. Some kind of easy, bright memory I can reach for and try to convince myself I’m not completely broken. I remember playing back here with friends, following Darren around like he was my hero, helping Dad build the fence, riding my bike in endless loops… it was the perfect childhood.
Or at least, it should have been.
