7. Maxine
CHAPTER 7
maxine
T he seasons changed slowly at the ranch, like watercolors bleeding into one another. Summer faded into fall, then winter, and now spring crept in again. Before I knew it. one year had passed since I'd first walked through the door to the house. Though, sometimes it felt like yesterday and other times like a lifetime ago.
I'd settled into a routine, if you could call it that. Mornings were spent helping Sebastian with the horses—something I'd initially resisted but now found myself looking forward to. There was peace in the repetitive motion of grooming, in the quiet understanding between human and animal. The horses didn't expect me to smile when I didn't feel like it or pretend everything was fine. I missed going to the equine center at home and volunteering; I missed Thunder.
"You’ve always had a way with them," Sebastian said one morning as he watched me lead Storm, a temperamental mare, back to her stall. "She’s not one to warm up to people easily."
I glanced at Storm, a hint of pride flickering through me. "Sometimes, it’s just about being patient enough to let them come around."
Brooklyn had always been more than Sebastian’s sister—she’d been my best friend for as long as I could remember. Over the past year, though, she became my anchor in ways I hadn’t anticipated. When I tried to retreat into my grief, shutting out the world, Brooklyn was relentless, refusing to let me disappear into myself.
"Get dressed," she'd announced one Saturday morning, barging into my room and throwing open the curtains. "We're going on an adventure."
I'd pulled the covers over my head. "I'm not really in the adventure mood."
"Tough luck," she'd replied, yanking my blanket away. "Because I need a model for my photography project, and you're it. Unless you want me to tell Sebastian how you’ve had a massive crush on him when we were twelve?"
That got me up. "You wouldn't dare."
Her grin had been wicked. "Try me."
That was how I found myself perched on Storm's back at sunrise, while Brooklyn circled us with her camera and directed me to ‘look more mysterious’ and ‘channel your inner-cowgirl goddess’. What started as blackmail turned into something else entirely. Laughter, real laughter, bubbled up from somewhere I thought had gone dry.
After that, Brooklyn became my partner in crime. She snuck into my room late at night with contraband snacks, and we watched terrible reality TV shows, providing our own commentary. She taught me how to line dance in the barn—mostly so she could laugh at my complete lack of rhythm—and I helped her with her English essays, which mostly meant preventing her from writing everything in emojis.
"You know what your problem is?" she said one night as we lay on the grass, stargazing. "You think you have to be sad all the time to prove you loved your dad."
I turned to look at her, ready to be angry, but she kept going.
"It's okay to have good moments, Max. It doesn't make the bad ones any less real. Or your love for him any less."
Nights were still the hardest. That was when the memories came flooding back—Dad's laugh, the way he'd sing off-key while cooking, how he always knew exactly what to say when everything felt wrong. I'd lay awake, clutching my dragonfly locket, trying to remember the exact sound of his voice. It scared me sometimes, how the edges of those memories seemed to be softening, like old photographs left too long in the sun. Sometimes I snuck into Sebastian’s room, and we just talked until I got sleepy again. I fell asleep in his room more than once; in his arms was where I felt the safest.
I often found Brooklyn waiting in the kitchen with two mugs of hot chocolate. She never asked if I was okay; she already knew the answer. Instead, she told me ridiculous stories about Sebastian's most embarrassing moments, or showed me her latest photography projects, sometimes even just sat with me in comfortable silence. She never pushed or prodded, and that was what made her the perfect sister and best friend.
Ciara and David's relationship grew more obvious with each passing week. The casual touches, the private smiles, the way they'd finish each other's sentences. I tried not to watch, but it was like a car crash—impossible to look away. Every time I saw them together, it felt like another betrayal, another crack in the foundation of my memories.
"They're not trying to hurt you, you know," Sebastian said one evening as we sat on the fence watching the sunset. We'd made a habit of these quiet moments when the day's work was done, and the world seemed to slow down. Where we could spend time together and nobody thought anything of it because it was something Sebastian had always done.
"I know," I replied, kicking my boots against the wooden post. "That almost makes it worse." He nodded, understanding what I couldn't put into words. That was what I appreciated most about Sebastian—he never tried to fix things, never offered empty platitudes. He just sat with me in the mess of it all.
The ranch itself had started to feel less foreign, though, I still couldn't bring myself to call it home. I learned its rhythms: which floorboards creaked, which windows caught the morning light, which paths led to the best thinking spots. Brooklyn showed me all her secret hideaways—the old oak tree, perfect for reading, the hidden pond where she practiced photography, and the ridge where you could see for miles.
"This is where I come when everything gets to be too much," she told me, leading me to a small clearing behind the barn. "When Dad and Sebastian are being overprotective, or when I just need to breathe."
She helped me set up my own space in the old tack room, dragging in cushions and fairy lights, transforming it into a sanctuary where I could write in my journal or just be alone with my thoughts.
But underneath it all, there was this constant tension, like a guitar string wound too tight. I could feel it in the way Ciara looked at me when she thought I wasn't paying attention, in the careful way David tried to include me in family discussions. They were trying to build something new, while I was trying to hold onto what was lost.
One morning, I found a photo that had slipped behind my dresser during the move—Dad and me on my thirteenth birthday, both of us laughing at some forgotten joke. I traced his face with my finger, and for the first time in months, the tears that came weren't entirely bitter. I pinned it to my mirror, next to a picture Brooklyn had taken of Sebastian and me on horseback at sunset, past and present side by side.
"That's my best work," Brooklyn said, pointing to the sunset photo. "I call it 'Pining in Purple Hour.'" She dodged my playful swat with a laugh.
Maybe that was what healing looked like: not moving on, but moving forward, carrying the past with you like a precious stone in your pocket. Not lighter, exactly, but somehow more bearable with each passing day. And having a friend like Brooklyn who could make you laugh even when you thought you'd forgotten how, made the weight a little easier to carry.
Still, nothing could have prepared me for what came next.