The Problem with Falling (Problems #3)

Chapter 41

CHAPTER 41

Willow

I spent a month driving around the Midwest, searching for a feeling. Searching for answers. Searching for me. I didn’t know myself as deeply as I thought, mainly because I’d spent the past few years running away from self-reflection. But as I tried to figure out my own thoughts, my mind always wandered back to two people: Theo and Anna.

When I found myself back in Honey Creek, I knew it was time to face my biggest fear. I needed to talk to her—speak to Anna after all these years. Otherwise, I’d never be able to truly move on.

I stood outside of the Lanes’ home, fiddling with my fingers. They weren’t in the same home I used to visit Anna at when we were kids. They had a much bigger property, with acres of land and horses. Anna always wanted horses. We used to talk about getting a few of our own when we were old enough.

It took me a solid ten minutes to build up enough courage to ring the front doorbell. When I did, my breath caught in my throat. I waited for the door to be answered, and when it was, Mrs. Lane appeared. Her eyes widened with shock as she stared at me.

“What in the world are you doing here?” she spat out. “How dare you come here?”

“Mom? Who is it?” Anna called out. Just hearing her voice sent chills down my spine. It had been such a long time since I’d heard her voice.

Anna came to the door, and she looked just as shocked as her mother had when Mrs. Lane opened the front door.

“Willow,” Anna breathed out. Her look wasn’t packed with anger like Mrs. Lane’s had been. It was more so confusion and surprise. “What are you doing here?”

She looked beautiful. Her dark black hair was pulled back into a ponytail. She wore a pink bow in her hair, too. She had makeup on that highlighted her high cheekbones. I always loved her cheekbones. Her face wasn’t as grim as when I’d last seen her. There was a light in her eyes that was missing the night we ran into each other a month or so ago.

I tugged on the sleeves of my coat as the winter breeze danced across my cheeks. “Hi, Anna. I was wondering if maybe we could talk.”

“Oh, absolutely not,” Mrs. Lane raged. “How dare you come here with such a request? You need to—”

“Okay.” Anna cut in, moving closer.

Her mom’s eyes fell on her daughter. “What?”

“I want to talk to Willow, Mom,” Anna said confidently.

Mrs. Lane grimaced. “But, Anna—”

“Mom,” Anna stated sternly. “Please give Willow and me some time alone.”

Mrs. Lane’s shoulders dropped as she stared at her daughter. She then turned her eyes toward me, and they were cold as ice. It was clear she had more to say, but instead, she muttered slightly, glanced at her daughter for a second, then marched away.

Anna moved her wheelchair closer to the front door. She smiled at me, and that was almost enough to make me burst into tears. “Come in, Willow. We can talk in my room.”

I nodded in agreement, and Anna led me to her bedroom. After I walked in, she closed the door behind her. I glanced around the room, staring at photographs that looked so remarkable. They were photos of landscapes and beautiful sunsets over Lake Michigan.

On her bookshelf was a spread of romance novels. Dozens and dozens of romance novels. She still loved love.

That fact alone made my heart skip.

On her dresser drawer was a collection of professional cameras. Some looked antique.

I fiddled with my hands, still tugging on the sleeve of my coat. As I turned to look at Anna, she was already staring at me.

“You can have a seat,” she said, gesturing toward the bed.

I sat.

She moved in closer.

We stared at one another for a while before I built up enough courage to talk. Right as I parted my mouth to speak, Anna had, too. We tripped over our words, nervously laughed, and I cleared my throat. “You first.”

“Sorry, Willow. It’s just… I’m confused as to why you’re here,” Anna said, resting her hands in her lap.

“I wanted to check in on you. To see how you’ve been.”

It sounded idiotic, but it was true.

She lowered her eyebrows. “I’m sorry, this all just feels very random.” She turned her stare from me and glanced toward her window. “It’s been years.”

“I know.” I nodded. My heart pounded against my chest. “But I’ve thought about you every single day for all these years and—”

“You left,” she blurted out. When she turned back toward me, her eyes flashed with a heaviness that almost broke my heart. “Years ago. You left me and Honey Creek and never looked back, Willow. When you did visit your family, you never attempted to see me. So why now?”

“That’s not true,” I urged, shaking my head. “I tried to see you repeatedly.”

“No, you didn’t.” She smiled, but it felt so heartbreakingly sad. “I was in the hospital for months after the accident, Willow.”

“I know. I was there every day.”

She shook her head. “No. You weren’t.”

Her words perplexed me. Why would she say that? I sat in that hospital waiting room for days, weeks on end, waiting to see her. Waiting to hear that she was all right. Waiting for a chance to apologize for everything I’d done.

“Anna… I was there. I waited in the waiting room all day and night for months.”

Her eyes narrowed with confusion. “What are you talking about?”

“I was there,” I expressed, placing my hands against my chest, over my heart that pounded a million miles per hour. Tears flooded my stare. “I wanted nothing more than to talk to you. To make sure you were all right. To be there for you. But your mom would come out into the waiting room and tell me that it wasn’t a good day. That’s what she said at first. Then it was how you refused to see me. Then how you wanted nothing to do with me because I ruined your life.”

Anna’s eyes flashed with realization. “What? My mom said that?”

I sniffled and placed my hands in my lap. “Yeah. So after some time, she convinced me that my existence in your life was a burden to you. And that I’d already stolen so much from your life, from your future, that it would be best if I stayed away. That’s why I left Honey Creek. I didn’t want to hurt you anymore.”

“What? No… Willow…” She shook her head, and tears fell from her eyes. The moment her teardrops kissed her cheeks, my own fell, too. She sniffled and continued shaking her head. “She told me you left without a word. She said you never showed up and that I should just move on. So that’s what I did. Why would she do that? Why would she…?” Anna looked away and shut her eyes as she tried to gather her emotions. When she looked back at me, her brown eyes were soaked with pain. “You were my best friend. I needed you back then. You were my person.”

“And you were mine, Anna. I just thought… I mean, the accident… I caused it to happen, and your mom made it clear how it was so unfair how I stole so much of your life from you and—”

“Stole my life from me?” she asked, baffled. “What do you mean?”

“Your dreams, Anna. You had dreams of so much, and I took that from you.”

“No offense, Willow, but you don’t have that power over my life. And you weren’t the drunk drivers that night. Carter and Eric were. They hit us , not the other way around. It wasn’t your fault.”

It wasn’t your fault.

How could she say that?

How could she say it wasn’t my fault?

“But I…” My mind tried to make sense of the words she was saying. I’d spent the past years blaming myself. So I had a million thoughts in my head, screaming the complete opposite of what Anna was telling me. “If we hadn’t gone to the party that night, you would’ve never been in that situation. And I spilled the water, and well, I—”

“Oh my gosh,” she murmured. Anna moved in closer to me. Her voice was a whisper. “Have you been blaming yourself all these years? You think you ruined my life?”

I sniffled and brushed the back of my hand beneath my nose. “Yes.”

Anna placed a hand on my knee. “Willow… I didn’t know why you left. I knew nothing of what my mom was telling you.”

“I’d been updating her for years. Telling her when I was coming into town so she could make sure we didn’t cross paths. She said it would be too triggering for you. So that’s why I stayed away for so long. I didn’t want to hurt you more than I already had.”

Anna’s shoulders slumped. “My mom can be well…you know,” she grumbled and rubbed her hand over her face, “controlling.”

I did remember that quite well.

“But… I never blamed you. Did it suck for a long time? Yeah. But did it suck because of you? No. If anything, the part that sucked the most was not having you by my side through it all.”

I wiped the tears that kept falling from my eyes. “I wanted to be here, Anna. I swear to you, I wanted to be by your side every step of the way. I just… I thought…” Oh my gosh. All these years… All this lost time…

She smiled. It was small, but it felt so big. My clementine. My forever favorite clementine. “During the hardest parts of my recovery, the only thing that got me through it was thinking, ‘What would Willow do?’ Whenever I felt weak and thought I couldn’t keep going on, I’d think that to myself. And then, I’d find my strength to keep going.” Anna reached out for my hand and took it in hers. “Willow…if anything, you saved me. Without you in the back of my mind, I would’ve given up so long ago. Don’t you remember from when we were kids? You were the reason I lived life instead of staying dormant.”

I broke into uncontrollable sobs from those words alone.

“I’m so sorry, Anna. I’m so sorry for everything,” I cried. “I should’ve stayed longer. I should’ve reached out more, but I didn’t think that was what you wanted. And then, when I saw how sad you were last month, I felt an even heavier amount of guilt and well—”

Anna laughed, making my words fade off.

“Willow… When I saw you in town that night, I was sad. But it wasn’t because of my situation. That was the day of my grandmother’s funeral. We were going for ice cream for a pick-me-up after the service. It was a bad day, not a bad life.”

Oh my gosh.

I felt so silly.

Anna’s smile widened as she patted my hand in hers. “I have a beautiful life. Are some days hard? Yes. But everyone has hard days. I mostly have amazing ones, though. And there have been so many days when I wanted to share parts of it with you.” She wiped her own tears away. “There have been so many days when I wished you were still my best friend.”

“Tell me,” I begged, my voice cracking from the overwhelming emotions swirling within me. “Can you tell me about all the beautiful parts?”

“Only if I can tell you about the ugly parts, too. Because that’s what I am. I’m the beauty and the beast. It’s what makes me…me.”

“Tell me it all,” I pleaded. “I want to know all about you, Anna. Every single detail. Every single word.”

She told me everything.

She got a degree in photography. She loved blueberries more than strawberries nowadays. She still laughed during sunsets and cried during sunrises. Her favorite color was midnight blue, but jade was a second favorite. She didn’t watch thriller movies at all because they gave her too much anxiety. She’d finally read and watched the Harry Potter series and was a Hufflepuff. Her mother was still overbearing. She had her first kiss with a guy named Jason, who used too much tongue. She had many more kisses since Jason. Her current crush was River Pierce, which wasn’t shocking—the Pierce brothers were everyone’s crush at some point in their lives. River was a good option.

She still loved love stories most of all.

She missed me.

I missed her.

Oh, how I missed her.

Each time she told me something about her current life, a weight lifted from my shoulders. Anna hadn’t missed out on life. If anything, she’d lived it to the fullest. From winning horseback riding competitions to baking sourdough bread to sell at the Honey Creek farmers’ market—which, let me tell you, wasn’t easy. Her photographs were published in National Geographic magazines. She showed me all the copies. I cried. She cried. We cried. She traveled the world and touched the oceans and seas. Nothing held her back. Nothing kept her still.

Anna Lane was an adventure seeker who lived each day as if it were her last.

And finally, I felt as if I could breathe for the first time in eight years.

Then I told her everything.

I told her about the places I’d been and the boys I’d kissed. I told her I still laughed during sunsets and cried during sunrises. How my favorite color was lavender. How that was also my favorite scent. How I still hid under blankets during horror movies and still never finished them. How I loved love stories most of all. How I fell in love with a man who I swore I couldn’t have. How I missed him.

Oh, how I missed him.

We talked for hours, not even noticing that the sun had set and it was now dark outside. Anna listened to every word I gave her with those wide doe eyes that I always loved.

“Theodore, huh?” she said with a smile in her eyes.

“Yes, but only his grandmother can call him that,” I teased.

“You have to get him back.”

I shrugged. “I want to, but…” I sighed and looked down at my hands in my lap. “Sometimes I think I’m too much. Too emotional for love. I feel everything so deeply, to the point that it’s almost suffocating. Theo is a good man. The best one I’ve ever met. And I cannot imagine him having to deal with all of me for the rest of his life. With all of my feelings and flightiness and emotions. I’m too much.”

“Never,” she said, placing her hand on my kneecap. “Willow Kingsley, you do feel a lot. You feel everything. And I don’t know where on your path you decided that feeling deeply was a flaw because it’s not. It’s what makes you…you. It’s your greatest superpower. Your light, your emotional depth, your ability to see things differently than most are what brings joy to this world. I always said the world needed more Willows in it. If we had more people like you, more empaths, I think the world would heal.”

I couldn’t wrap my head around how kind Anna had been to me. Though her kindness wasn’t shocking. After all this time, she was exactly who she’d always been.

My clementine.

My favorite fruit.

My best friend.

“You know what I think you should do?” she asked me.

“What’s that?”

“Let that man love you. Some people think loving others is the hardest thing to do, but the truth is it’s much harder to allow yourself to be loved. It’s hard to make peace with your past mistakes, with feeling unworthy, with self-doubts. It’s tough to believe that anyone would ever see the good in you, so a lot of people push others away. They think they are unworthy of love because of their missteps in life. But I think everyone deserves love. Maybe the broken ones deserve it a little bit more than most. So Willow…let him love you. If he is the man you’re claiming him to be, I bet he’ll love you forever, too, with no restraints. He’ll love you and still let you fly high while never asking you to change.”

I wiped my tears. “I missed you, Anna.”

“I missed you, too. Now go get your happily ever after. I’ll be here when you get back. Or, I’ll be in Paris, but you can always meet me there for a croissant or something, too,” she joked.

I hugged her for the longest time. We cried in one another’s arms and laughed like complete fools.

She told me she loved me after all the time that had passed.

“You love me? Still?” I whispered, stunned by her confession.

“Still,” she replied.

I cried harder.

So that was what unconditional love looked like—love that saw one’s flaws and still called them beautiful.

As she led me to the front door of her home to say goodbye, she called out to me. “Willow?”

“Yes?”

“Don’t be a stranger, okay? Whenever you’re in Honey Creek, please find me.”

I smiled. “I’ll find you in every lifetime, Anna.”

I knew she’d find me, too.

“You owe me a road trip on Big Bird, too,” she said, waving goodbye.

I promised her I’d take her wherever her heart desired. After we said goodbye, I cried during my whole way back to Westin Lake. It was time to face another fear.

The entire drive up to Westin Lake, I thought about what I’d actually say to Theo when I arrived. I’d want to tell him how I missed him so deeply and not a second had passed without me thinking about him. I’d been thinking about him every single day for the past few weeks.

Every day.

Every hour.

Every minute.

Every second.

When I found myself and Big Bird parked in front of his house late that evening, I took a deep breath.

I was scared, but I still knocked on his front door.

I held my breath the whole time I waited for him to answer, and when Theo opened the door, I released the breath and began to do what I’d done best. I began to yap. “Hi, oh, sorry. Are you busy? I should’ve called. I didn’t call, but I should’ve. I know this is random, and I should’ve called. Oh gosh, are you busy? I can come back later. I’m sorry I parked on your property. Do you have company? Gosh, this was stupid. I shouldn’t have just shown up uninvited and, well—”

He cut into my monologue. “Willow?”

“Yes?”

“ Breathe .”

I sighed.

Okay.

I took another small breath. “I’m sorry,” I spat out, my body starting to shake. “I’m sorry I got scared and ran away. When you and I were in Honey Creek, I saw Anna in town, and I panicked, thinking it was unfair that I was able to find happiness when I stole that joy from her. Then today, she and I finally talked, and I realized I didn’t ruin her life. Her life is… full . Fuller than most people, I think. Full of love, light, and joy. I think if most people lived their lives like Anna, they’d be much happier. Still… I can never express how much I struggled to leave you, Theo. Because the thing is, I love you. I love you so much that it scares me. I love you so much that it’s hard to breathe when you’re not with me. I miss you. I miss your smell. I miss your warmth. I miss your touch. I miss you . And I know how much it must’ve hurt you to have me leave, especially with how the people in your past left and hurt you.

“Which is why I did it. I did it to be cruel so you wouldn’t come searching for me because I knew that would keep you away. I knew leaving would be the nail in the coffin. But then…”

I took another breath as tears built in my eyes, and I continued speaking, “You still came to find me. You still stayed strong. You stayed when I tried to run away. You were the steady tree to my hummingbird. And I’m sorry. I don’t know if you’ll want me back, and that’s okay. But I have to tell you that I want you . I want all of you, every day, for the rest of forever. I can’t promise that I won’t get scared sometimes. I can’t promise that I won’t feel the need to fly around every now and again, but if you’ll have me again, I promise this.” I stomped my foot down on his front porch. “I promise to land. I promise never to drift too far ever again. I promise to always fly back. I promise you…me. All of me, even the hard parts. I promise to always return to you because you are my safe place to land. You are it for me, Theo. You are my home.”

He stared down at me for a moment’s time. I wasn’t certain what he was thinking. His face was stern, but his eyes were gentle. “Well, my Weeping Willow,” he said. His lips turned up slightly, and he held a hand out toward me. “Welcome home.”

When I took his hand, he pulled me into a tight embrace, kissing my lips softly. I melted into him without a fear of falling because I knew he’d catch me gently while protecting my fragile wings.

Home.

I was finally home.

My favorite place to be.