Will snorted. “Hell, of course he’s not. His punching bag has been out of town.”
“He’s going to get some help. He admitted something was wrong.
All I have to do is find a therapist.”
Will picked at a blade of grass. “No guarantees,” he said curtly. “Old dogs, new tricks—you know what they say. What are you going to do when he goes after the baby?”
Will watched her face freeze at the very idea, something he imagined she’d been trying hard not to consider.Fine, he thought, watching her work to keep her emotions in check,let me burst her little bubble. He wanted to hurt her. He wanted to see her cry just like he was doing on the inside.
“He won’t touch Connor,” Cassie said emphatically. “That would hit too close to home for him.”
“No pun intended,” Will bit out.
Cassie jumped to her feet, showering Will with the pieces of grass she’d been ripping to shreds in her lap. “What is the matter with you?”
she said, her voice thick with tears. “I thought you were a friend of mine. I thought you would want me to be happy.”
I do,Will thought.I just want you to be happy with me.“Funny,” he said. “You figured that the only wayI’dbe happy is if I did the things you thought would be best for me.”
Cassie glared at him. “What do you mean by that?”
“You know. ‘Don’t turn your back on your Sioux blood, Will.’ Hanging up my goddamn medicine bundle in L.A. so it stared me in the face every time I passed it by.”
“You pulled it off the wall,” Cassie said. “How was I supposed to know any better?” She poked at a rock with her toe. “Besides,” she said smugly, “I was right. Look at how much you’ve changed since you’ve come back to Pine Ridge—it’s obvious that the only person who gives a damn about your being half white is you.”
Will pulled himself to his feet, staring right at Cassie. “What I want to know is how comeI’mnot allowed to turn my back on my history, but you don’t have to play by the same rules?”
Cassie took a step backward. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Will grabbed her shoulders. “You do. You know what he’s done to you before, you know he’s going to do it again.” His mouth twisted.
“I couldn’t escape the past, no matter how hard I tried. Neither can Alex, and neither can you.”
Cassie knew the advice she’d given Will served her own situation just as well. There was, really, nothing you could use as a blueprint for your life, except your past. There was no starting over. There was only picking up the pieces someone had left behind.
“That,” Cassie said, her voice breaking, “is exactly why I have to go back.”
AFTER CASSIE SPENT THE EARLY MORNING SAYING GOODBYE TO CYrus and Dorothea, Will drove her and Connor into town to meet Alex. Connor had been fussy in the car, and Cassie handed him to Will, knowing that Alex was watching from across the street and grateful that Connor’s cries had offered her an excuse to do so. After all that Will had selflessly given her and Connor, she could not go without letting him hold the baby a last time.
They had come to a fragile peace. Cassie fiddled with the drawer of the glove compartment, pretending to check inside for anything that might be hers. Across the seat, Will was rubbing his hand across Connor’s frail back. “Well,” Cassie said brightly. “You’ll write and tell me where you wind up?”
Will glanced up at her. “I said I would.”
Cassie nodded. “Yes, you did.” She reached out her arms, and Will placed the baby in them, their hands brushing each other. Then she looked out the front window of the pickup, trying to commit to memory the flagpole in front of the school, the hot red dirt caked into the tires of the truck, the tilt of Will’s hat on his forehead. “I’m going to miss this place,” she said.
Will laughed. “Give yourself ten minutes,” he said. “It’s real easy to forget.”
Cassie looped her hand through the straps of Connor’s diaper bag.
“Well then, I’m going to miss you.”
“Now that,” Will said, grinning, “will take longer than ten minutes.”
Cassie lurched across the seat, throwing her free arm around Will’s neck. Will hugged her back, taking away the soft grass scent of her hair, the smooth curve of her bare shoulder, the timbre of her voice.
Connor lay pressed between their chests, like the shared heart of Siamese twins.
It was Alex who pulled them apart. Cassie heard his deep voice through her open window, where he’d come to stand. “Sorry,” he said.
