My mouth opens, but there are no words.
Shit. What do you say to someone in this situation?Sorry. Wow. That must have been so hardall feel like a pathetic response.
Instead of words, I scoot closer to him, rest my head on his shoulder, and loop my arm with his.
“How old were you?” I ask, even though I have a feeling I know the answer.
“Seventeen, and it … changed … everything.”
He blows out a breath.
“I didn’t know if I should tell my mom or confront my dad and demand he tell her.”
He holds his head up high. “When I finally decided to ask him about it first, he told me I was lying, I saw nothing, and I needed to get back to what I do best… go practice with the football in the backyard.Stop imagining things, Dutton, is what he said as I rushed out his office door.”
The arm I'm looped around drops, causing our hands to touch, pinky to pinky. This is unfamiliar territory for me with him, but not touching him right now feels wrong. I brush his finger with mine as he goes on.
“So, I went on a run, and I ran and ran and somehow found this place. I sat here for an hour before I decided that I didn’t want to hurt my mom. She’s amazing and the sweetest woman I’ve ever met, but if I saw my dad do this again, I would go straight to her. So, I went home, and that night, sitting at the dinner table, I knew my dad would never look at me the same.”
“I’m so sorry, Dutton. I know those words mean nothing to you, but you were just a kid, and you should never have been put in that position. Especially not by a parent.”
He nods.
“I agree, but as you said, I was a kid, and a week later, I saw my father buying roses at Mrs. Buckley’s flower shop. I remember thinking,okay, good, he came to his senses, but that night at dinner, there were no roses in my house for my mom. Nor the next week when I saw him there again, or the week after that.”
Oh, no. It’s starting to make sense.
“Logic now tells me that Mrs. Buckley had no idea she was helping my dad have an affair, but the kid I was didn’t think that way when he broke in and cut up and smashed every flower in her store, a few of the glass coolers, too.”
I close my eyes, and a tear slips for a kid who, it’s very clear, our entire town has judged for all the wrong reasons.
“Hey,” Dutton says, softly placing a hand under my chin and forcing me to look at him. His hand then cups my face, his thumb swiping the tears away for me. “Don’t cry over that story.”
“I’m not crying over the story. I’m crying for you. You deserved better than how this town has treated you.”
“They were just going off what they knew at the time.”
“Still, it’s no excuse, and we are going to make them realize how wrong they were.”
I stand with intent.
“Come on,” I tell him and hold my hand out for him.
He puts his hand in mine but tugs me back down to sit.
“I didn’t bring you out here to tell you this—it just sort of happened. And no one knows, including Grace, so please do not tell her.”
“Okay,” I say instantly. “You can trust me.”
“I know,” he says on a breath. “But I brought you out here because taking time for yourself is not failing, and sometimes stepping away can give you a different perspective.”
I hold my hand up. “Wait a second. You just told me something that changed your life in a huge way, but you want to focus on me and my bakery?”
He nods.
“I do, but mostly I want you to focus on you.”
“Why?”
