“Sure, buddy.”
“Can we bring sticks?”
“Bring all the sticks you want.”
“Can I bring my hockey stick?” He hops down off his chair and runs to put on his sneakers.
I cross to where Miranda’s started on the dishes and lay my hand against the small of her back.
“I’m going to take him on the walk and stop by Gabriel’s grave on the way back. Do you mind?”
She looks up at me. Her face has gone soft. “Of course not.”
“Half an hour, maybe forty minutes.”
“Take your time, Grayson.”
I kiss her temple and follow my son out the back door.
Ethan kicks at pine cones the whole way down, narrating the deer to me with total seriousness. I half-listen and watch him, the gold afternoon light moving across his hair, the confident swing of his shoulders, the glance he throws back every few yards to check that I’m still behind him.
We sit on the rock above the lake for a while. He shows me the place in the soft mud where the deer’s hoofprints came down to the water. He tells me the deer was a doe with her fawn close by, and he had to stay quiet so he wouldn’t scare them.
“You did the right thing.”
He grins at me, a quick private grin, and tucks his hand into mine for the walk back.
We turn off the trail before we reach the grave. There are two stones now, set side by side under the old oak that’s been on this property since before my grandfather bought it. The secondstone was Miranda’s idea, six months after her transformation, when she found out Annie had never been laid to rest beside Gabriel. She asked if we could put a marker here for Annie anyway, so the two of them would have a place together. I cried in front of Miranda for the first time that night.
The two stones sit side by side now. Gabriel Wolfe, beloved brother, gone too soon. Annie Wolfe, beloved sister, gone too soon.
Ethan’s quiet at my side. He’s been here with me a handful of times, and he knows what we’re doing without me saying it.
“Hi, Uncle Gabriel,” he murmurs, barely there, and then he nods at me and leaves me alone.
“Hi, Gabe.” My voice has gone rough. “Hi, Annie.”
I crouch in front of the stones, reaching down to pull a few weeds from the soft ground at the base of Gabriel’s marker, the same thing I’ve done every visit for all these years. The earth is cold under my fingers. I leave the bunch of dandelions Ethan gathered on the walk down propped against the base of Annie’s stone where she’d have wanted them. Annie liked dandelions. She said they were the only flower with the decency to grow where nobody asked for it. I press my fingers flat to the cool stone for a moment.
“I’ll see you again, brother.” My voice has gone very low. “I don’t know when. But I will. I’m never going to stop missing you, either of you, and I need you to know that. Every day for the rest of my life, I’ll be thinking about you.”
The wind moves through the upper branches of the oak.
“But I’m going to live now, Gabriel. Your nephew has a sister who calls him Dada, and there’s another one coming. I’m going to love them every single day instead of grieving you every single day. You taught me how, watching you with Annie. So I’m keeping the lesson.”
I swallow. “We’re naming him after you. Gabe Wolfe, if it’s a boy. So by spring you’ll have a namesake running around this property, a fierce little nephew with your name. Try not to spoil him from wherever you are.” I pause. “You look after her, Gabe. Keep an eye on Annie, up there or wherever you both are. We’re looking after each other down here.”
I press my palm flat to the stone a final time, then push to my feet.
Ethan approaches me. His face is solemn. “Dad.”
“Yes, buddy.”
“Will you always miss Uncle Gabriel?”
“Yes,” I say quietly. “He was my best friend.”
He thinks about that a moment. Then he nods, slowly and seriously, taking it in.
