“I’ll call you when I get there,” I say, pulling back from him. “Let you know where I’m staying.”
He wipes at his eyes, and I can see he’s trying to hold back the emotion rising to the surface. “It’s hard to imagine what tomorrow will feel like, when you’re not here.” He shakes his head, draws an inhale. “But I’m proud of you. Get as far away from this place as you can.”
I nod.
“I’ll come visit you,” he promises.
“No you won’t,” I answer, knowing he’ll never leave this town.
He laughs, eyes watering. “I hope you find whatever you’re looking for out there.”
“I hope you find something good here.”
“You know me, I’ll be fine.” He lifts a shoulder. “I was actually thinking of renting a place in town, getting out of this house.”
“Seriously?”
“Mr. Sanchez has an apartment above the guitar shop. He said I could rent it cheap if I worked at the shop.”
I smile at my brother. He may never leave this town, but maybe he’ll escape this awful house. “You deserve something that’s all yours.”
He will always be the boy who chases love headfirst: without caution, without fear. He crashes into it, scraped knees and bruised elbows, he leaves fire and smoke in his wake, but he keeps on moving forward. He doesn’t look back. He doesn’t scan elm trees for old lost loves.
He’s braver than me. But maybe he’s also growing up a little, making decisions for himself that aren’t bound by our family’s destiny.
“Hold on…,” he says. He turns and jogs back into his bedroom, then emerges moments later. He grabs my hands and shoves something into my palm.
I peer down at a wad of carefully folded bills. “Where did you get this?”
He folds my fingers over it. “Been saving it,” he says.
I lift an eyebrow. “Archer, seriously, where did you get it?” Doubting that he came by it honestly.
The corner of his mouth curls into a smirk. “Been giving guitarlessons for the last couple of years. When you’re at school, I’ve been working.”
I shake my head at him.
“I don’t tell my twin everything,” he says with a wink.
I hold the cash out to him, trying to give it back. “Archer, I can’t take this. And Dad already gave me everything in his wallet.”
But he pushes my hand away. “I want you to have it. You’re going to need more than you think to start a new life out there. It’s your getting-the-hell-out-of-Cutwater gift.”
I feel the tears coming. “Thank you.” I can barely meet his eyes, and he pushes me gently in the shoulder. I glance around the tiny house one last time, taking in every last detail.
The home that raised me. The home that cursed me.
I wonder if I’ll miss it. If I’ll think of it fondly, years from now, the dark memories fading with time.
Or if it will always feel like a place woven with the worst kind of shadows.
I swivel around, and Archer has grabbed my suitcase and is carrying it through the front door. I hear him descend the porch steps, hefting my suitcase over the creek. “I should have tried to borrow a car,” he calls from outside. “Then I could drive you to the train station.”
“I’m fine to walk,” I answer.
I start for the open door, when my eyes flash one last time over the kitchen table, stacked with unopened mail. Love letters addressed to Archer. Most still unopened. Evidence of the madness that plagues us each summer. But there’s something else among the heart-adorned letters.
A postcard.
