When Sky Breaks: Burn & Break Duet Book 2

53. Sky

When your pastconverges with your present, the feelings associated with it collide from each messy end. It’s a dichotomy I’m only beginning to sort through a week later.

The sights and sounds of the fall festival barely register through my jumbled thoughts.

Even August’s arm around my waist doesn’t pull me from my funk, nor does the image of Foster taking half of Trek’s bag of roasted peanuts and scattering them to the birds in the park near the fried Oreo booth conjure a laugh.

I’ll get there, though, once I’ve dug through the muck of my reality. My mom is dead. I have other biological family members eager to meet me. Everything is different yet the same as I watch Trek toss a peanut at Foster once he discovers most are filling the bellies of sparrows and neighboring squirrels.

“This bag of nuts cost like eight bucks, old man, and you’re feeding the rodents,” Trek says, keeping the small, greasy sack out of the way when Foster lifts a hand for more.

“You know you’ll be buying up some of that cotton candy when Hazel gets here. So quit your complaining.”

“I’ll be feeding her and my baby, not the animals,” he counters with a smirk on his face.

August laughs and the rumble at my side soothes any negative thoughts I had. The idea of Trek becoming a father is growing on Foster and he insisted Trek invite Hazel to hang with us at the festival.

He looks frail, sitting on a bench catching his breath, but he was adamant about coming.

“Quit looking at me like I’m going to keel over, honey. Enjoy your time. Go. I’ll be okay,” he says, shooing me away.

Once I exhausted all my tears on August’s shoulder following the phone call with my Aunt Loren, I told Trek and Foster. It was a group hug fest after that, and within the comfort of all their arms, I knew I could get through whatever life threw at me.

August steers me toward the firehouse and The Villain’s Playground to see how all our hard work has panned out.

“I guess you were right.” August squeezes our laced fingers.

I look up into his gray eyes alight with amusement. “And what is that?”

He squints at all the booths, the people, the Halloween decorations. “I suppose all this fanfare is worth it.”

He tweaks the cat ears sitting on the top of my hair. I somehow convinced him to dress up as something other than a traveling photographer. I told him that was cheating. Who knew he’d look just as cute with his own set of cat ears? It’s obvious he only agreed because it would make me happy, but I appreciate it all the same.

“Wish you were on duty taking pictures?”

He angles his head down, holding onto the headband before it slides off his head. “Not at all. I like seeing it from your eyes this time. I asked Alex to take them for me. She’s not half bad with a camera. Reminds me a bit of myself when I started working with Colonel.”

“Did I tell you I was a tiny bit jealous of her when I went to Snaps before cornering you in the cemetery?”

August pauses near a booth with shirts hanging on a rack for sale. Most have silly sayings stitched across the front. My favorite reads, “Dead Inside, But Caffeinated,” with a skeleton holding onto a steaming mug of coffee.

“Jealous of Alex? She’s like a little sister to me.”

“It’s not like I knew that. The only thing I did know was my ridiculous feelings meant I hadn’t gotten over you. I’m glad things worked out and you’re here with me. It feels like another proper date.”

“I owe you a million proper dates, Shortcake.”

“We have time for them now.”

He grins and takes my hand, squeezing my fingers in response. My heart swells a fraction, blocking some of the negativity I brought with me.

We round the back of the firehouse, the manicured lawn bustling with activity. Families huddle close, sharing fried elephant ears and powdery funnel cakes, laughing and enjoying themselves.

Ginger waves at me from her position next to a nearly smiling Colonel, and I wave back, a small grin indenting my cheeks. I love this little slice of small-town life. The sense of community and closeness is sometimes rare to find, even rarer to sustain over time.

August and I stand at the back of the line for the haunted house. I couldn’t very well construct this thing and not know what it looks like, completely finished and running.

We hear screams accompanied by a cackling Halloween soundtrack. Strobe lights positioned along one side of the house flicker and flash in time to spooky music. “The Monster Mash” brings a round of singing from the people in front of us.

“You doing okay?” August asks.

He’s asked every day since that phone call and I respond by hugging his arm tighter, the canvas of his jacket scratching my cheek. I love how much he cares and how much he shows me by checking in on how I’m doing. No matter how many nights I’ve spent at his house, waking up in his arms, I’ll never get over how positively in tune with my emotions he is.

The line moves us forward, the doors thwacking off each other as the next set of people walk through, dry ice seeping from underneath the wood. In a weird way, I’m grateful for that dry ice. It’s what put me back in August’s orbit five years ago.

“If it’s okay with you, I think I want to go through it alone.”

“Are you sure?” Concern wrinkles his brows.

“Positive. You didn’t seem all that interested in going through it, anyway.”

“I would for you, though. I can handle it. Just worried I can’t control what my fists will do if something jumps out at me.”

A laugh bubbles, and I rise to my tiptoes to kiss his scruffy cheek. “I’m good. I promise. Just want a moment to think, that’s all.”

He studies me before nodding. “I’ll be waiting for you on the other side.”

As if I had any doubts about that.

Soon, it’s my turn through the dark house. The door shuts with a sharp thwack behind me, and my eyes adjust to the strobe lights.

Someone jumps out and cackles in my face. A shriek, then a giggle shoots from my mouth, and I skitter further into the room.

Each section of the house offers its own brand of terrifying themes. By far, the scariest is the room full of dolls. That’s it. Just dolls of every shape and size lined up on a table, their eyes seeming to follow you as you walk past. I shudder and rush through the next set of doors.

After nearly screaming my head off when a masked man jumps out at me from behind a swinging pig carcass, I’m panting at the entrance to the last room. When my breaths quiet, I press through the long plastic sheets separating the bloody meat warehouse and the spooky forest.

A disjointed wolf howl blares from a speaker. Wind blows and hollers, the fans from above pulling my hair from my face. Real gravel crunches under my feet. Apparitions appear on the wall, ghosts flit between the trees, and laughter from ghastly-looking statues echoes. No one jumps out—no one is in here at all.

I pause in front of the cemetery, just beyond a short iron gate. Fake headstones all bear silly names of the dead.

Nora Gretz

Doug McGrave

Barry O’Live

Ima Goner

Although I laugh, I’m transported to the real cemetery across town. To the gravestones under the tall weeping willow, its long branches sweeping over Chase’s grave. My biological dad’s. August’s father. My mother, buried somewhere unknown to me.

A small swell of sadness grips my heart. I may never get all the answers I want, but I got what I need.

Closure.

Why Dannie ended her life isn’t up to me to figure out. Life is hard for some, unbearable for others, and pretending to understand the whys will never erase what happened.

One foot forward, one step at a time, like August said, is the only way through life. With loved ones, the steps are lighter, the days brighter, the worries less because you’re not alone. Some aren’t so lucky and lose their footing, leaving behind nothing but memories.

The remaining moments of the haunted house pass with no other thoughts.

Except one.

I’ve found my reason to wake up every day. The reason I spent the last several weeks in a free fall, careening toward a life where all the tragic bits disappear.

That reason stands off to the side once I exit the house. His hands are shoved deep in his pockets, seeking warmth from the chilly Halloween air as he rocks on his heels. His head is turned toward a group of older people who appear to be bickering over the benefits of hosting a bingo night next year during the festival.

The soft smile on his face and the pink on his cheeks bring stinging hot tears to the surface.

The whistle I let loose makes August whip his head. He shifts, and before one foot lifts to move forward, I run to him, seeking safety in his arms.

“What’s wrong? Damnit, I should’ve insisted on going in with you. Did someone hurt you?”

It’s almost comical how much this man wants to fight for me. I grin through the tears snaking down my face, cold in the wind. “No one, I’m fine.”

He brushes away the salt painting my cheeks. “Then what is it? Why did you whistle?” His whisper caresses my skin. “Need to run away with me?”

I shake my head, encased in his large palms. “No. I just wanted to run to you for once. Because you’re my home, August. My person.”

He bends and scoops me up, letting me bury my head in his neck while he tucks his face into my hair, both of us breathing in each other’s warmth and comfort.

“And you’re mine, Shortcake. Forever, this time.”