“A librarian? That’s really cool. I don’t even know how one becomes a librarian.”
“It’s harder than most people think,” she said casually. “But I love it. I love our library in particular because we’ve been able to expand some of the summer reading programs for kids. And we were able to add a library of things for folks to borrow, like power tools or ghost hunting kits.”
I grinned. “Ghost hunting kits?”
“Yep.” Maria beamed.
“Does the library have different hours on Wednesdays?” I asked curiously. “Or?—”
“It opens later during the week,” she said. “I usually work a couple hours here and then head over. The tips fund my love for special edition books. What brings you to Whynot?”
“Just visiting for a few weeks,” I said. “Needed an escape.”
“Got it. And out of all places, you chosehere—when it’s hotter than hell?”
“Yep,” I said. “How’d you end up in Whynot?”
Maria smiled. “Got family here, so it was an easy choice. I’ll bring y’all waters. Want anything else? Austin, your usual?”
“Yes, please.”
“What’s your usual?” I asked.
“We have peach cobbler pancakes that will probably be the death of me one day,” Austin groaned. “They’re fucking diabolical.”
“Sold.” I wasn’t even going to worry about my diet for the next few weeks. “I’ll take those too.”
“Great. I’ll be back in a bit.”
“Thanks.” Austin said. He waited until Maria was out of earshot, then his expression grew serious. “All right, Rayburn. Spill.”
“I feel like I should tell you to go first.” I hesitated for a moment, and then continued. “I’m sorry about your dad.”
His shoulders deflated. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you. Honestly, our phone calls became a weird form of escape for me. And you had so many good things going on, I wanted to hear about those instead of telling you what a fucking disaster everything was here.”
“But I would have come to his funeral. I would have flown down to support you. We’ve been friends for decades and you not telling me feels like a fucking gut punch.”
“I’m sorry. I am. I should have told you. I just couldn’t bring myself to. There was so much happening when he passed that it was easier to just . . .”
“Suffer alone?” I shook my head. “I know how you are. You always put everything on yourself. You should have leaned on our friendship.”
“There’s a lot I should have done,” Austin said. “And truly, I am sorry. There’s not really an excuse. I didn’t tell you. And that was fucked up of me.”
“It was fucked up.” I leaned back in the booth and studied him. “I haven’t been a good friend.”
Austin’s brows drew together. “That’s not true.”
“It is true. A good friend would have noticed something was off in our phone calls, right? I don’t know.”
He smiled despite the heaviness of our conversation. “It was bad, but easy to hide when talking with you. I think about him every day. I took on what I could. Avery ended up changing her entire life plan to come back here when she was supposed to be traveling the world painting and stuff. And Dallas . . . I don’t know. He won’t talk about it either.”
“Dallas never was much of a talker, if I remember correctly. Although, it seems he’s changed given that he’s a mechanic now.”
“Oh, don’t worry. He’s still a book nerd.” Austin leaned his head back against the booth. “Mom has gotten less social. We all go over for dinner on Sundays just to try to keep some sort of normal routine. But she’s pulled back from the community so much. I’ve tried pushing her out, but it’s hard.”
“You can’t do everything,” I said softly. “You’ve always tried to, but you can’t. You’re not Superman.”
“I have to be,” he said. “I don’t have a choice. There’s a lot of people who depend on me. A lot of families and small businesses. I’ve always been the one to help out, and always will be.”
