Chapter 46
46
BEVERLY, 1999
17 years old
The clock on the wall ticked too loud.
I sat at the kitchen table, my hands wrapped around a mug of now-cold tea, my foot tapping a restless rhythm against the floor. Mom sat across from me, flipping through the same page of her magazine over and over again.
Blake and Dad were supposed to be home an hour ago.
This had to be a bad sign, right? I tried to picture Dad raising his voice at Blake in the middle of a restaurant, scolding him for what we’d done, but it didn’t add up. Dad didn’t have it in him to make Blake feel uncomfortable, let alone upset him.
I told myself I was being ridiculous. That they were fine.
But something didn’t feel right.
I checked my phone again. Nothing.
“They’ll be back soon,” Mom said, her voice calm, though her fingers nervously fidgeted with the magazine pages. “You know how they get once they start talking.”
I forced a nod. “Yeah. Yeah, you’re right.”
But I wasn’t sure I believed it.
Because Blake always texted me. He always sent something, even when we were barely speaking.
But tonight? Nothing. Nothing but the slow, creeping dread curling inside in my stomach.
I swallowed hard, the lump in my throat growing heavier with each breath. Desperately, I shoved my hands under my thighs, willing them to stop shaking.
Mom sighed and set the magazine down. “Maybe they stopped to talk to someone.”
I nodded, even though my mind wasn’t convinced. “Yeah, that’s probably it.”
She offered a small smile, pushing herself up from the chair. “I’m going to make hot chocolate. Do you want?—”
The phone rang.
For a split second, relief washed through me.
Dad.
It had to be Dad.
But as Mom reached for the phone, something in me screamed no. Don’t answer it. Don’t pick it up. Let it keep ringing.
Let us stay here in this moment, where everything is still okay.
But Mom was already pressing the receiver to her ear. “Hello?”
The color drained from her cheeks so quickly that I felt dizzy just watching it happen. Her eyes flicked toward me, but they were distant, unfocused, like she was looking through me
My heart skipped a beat, then hammered painfully against my ribs. “Mom?”
Her fingers gripped the phone tighter. “No,” she whispered. “No, that can’t be?—”
I watched as her body folded in on itself.
“Mom,” I said, louder now, panic creeping into my voice. “What? What is it?”
The phone slipped from her hand.
I didn’t even realize I was standing until I reached her, catching her just before she could fall. “Mom,” I said again, barely able to breathe. “What happened?”
Her lips parted, but the only thing that came out was a quiet, broken sound.
“Mom,” I begged. “Please. What happened? What?—”
Her breath shuddered as she clutched my arms.
My whole body went numb as I watched her, helpless.
Every inch of me screamed for something to make sense of this.
Her lips moved again, but the words that came out were nothing more than a plea, a desperate gasp for air—a sound of pure anguish that seemed to claw its way out of her chest.
“Your… Your father.”
I wanted to scream. To demand answers.
She wasn’t saying anything that made sense.
“Mom,” I repeated, my voice breaking. I shook her, panic and fear swelling in my throat. “What about Dad? Mom, please!”
I had never felt so helpless in my life.
“Mom, please,” I begged again, “what?—”
“They said he’s gone.”
* * *
The funeral was a blur.
The heat pressed down on my skin, thick and oppressive. People surrounded me, dressed in black, whispering to each other in hushed voices, in awe of the man we were burying.
The hero.
The protector.
The man who gave everything to this city.
I didn’t want to hear it.
Because what was a hero when he was gone ? What was a hero when he left behind a daughter who still needed him?
I stood there, numb, my hands clenched at my sides, wanting nothing more than to grip Blake’s hand. But every time I moved, he pulled away.
He hadn’t spoken to me in days. Neither had Mom.
She was a shell of herself, barely acknowledging the people who stopped to squeeze her hands and offer their condolences.
She hadn’t shed a tear. Not since that night.
Not since she collapsed on the kitchen floor and screamed into my chest, her hands fisting my shirt as if she could wring the grief from my bones. Now, she was silent—staring at the coffin as if, by sheer will alone, she could stop time from moving forward. As if, by refusing to look away, she could keep him from being lowered into the ground.
How? How did this happen? Who let this happen?
I didn’t understand how I had ended up in this moment, staring at a coffin instead of my father’s face.
I longed for my mom’s arms around me, but she wasn’t there. Not really. Not in the way I needed. She was like a soulless being, existing but not living.
It was strange, what death did to a family.
People always said that grief had a way of bringing families closer, that loss made you hold on tighter to the ones you had left. But for us? It did the opposite. It was pulling us apart, creating walls instead of bridges. My family didn’t want to mourn together.
I kept waiting for someone to reach for me, to pull me close, and tell me this wasn’t real. But no one did.
Was it wrong that I needed love right now?
To ache for something as simple as human touch?
If Blake could just wrap his arms around me, even if only for a second, I knew I would feel better. It wouldn’t fix anything, wouldn’t heal the ache that seemed to stretch deeper every day, and it certainly wouldn’t bring my father back. But at least it would remind me that I wasn’t entirely alone in this.
“Blake,” I whispered in agony.
He didn’t respond. He didn’t even look at me. He just stood there, staring at the coffin as if he wished it would disappear.
I forced back the tears that threatened to spill, my chest tightening with the effort, and tried again, my voice trembling. “Why won’t you talk to me?” My voice broke. “It hurts so much.”
For years, I’d been convinced that love could fix what was broken. But now, I stood at my father’s grave, begging the boy I loved to look at me, and nothing was fixed. Nothing was healing. Love wasn’t enough.
One moment, love felt like the answer to every question, the cure for every wound, the force that made anything possible.
And the next, you found yourself desperately trying to use it as a remedy for things that cannot be healed, as glue for things too shattered to mend.
Blake shook his head slowly, his eyes never leaving the coffin. “Everyone I love always leaves me.”
My heart clenched in response. “Blake,” I choked out.
“I just need to be alone, Beverly.”
“No, you don’t,” I said quickly. Desperately . “Being alone is the worst thing for you right now. Let me be?—”
He turned to me abruptly, and when I saw the raw, unfiltered grief in his eyes, it nearly knocked the breath out of me.
“You don’t understand, do you? This was my fault. If I hadn’t been so selfish, we wouldn’t be standing here now.”
I shook my head before the words could even fully register. “No,” I said instantly. “No, Blake. None of this was your fault.”
His eyes flickered back to the coffin, distant and lost. “He would still be here if I hadn’t taken him to that restaurant,” he whispered, his voice thick with regret. “I could have had a day out with him any other time, but I was too damn impatient, wanting everything now. And now look what I’ve done.”
I took his hand in both of mine and squeezed, silently begging him to hear me. “This wasn’t your fault. You didn’t do this. We can’t change what happened, but we can choose what we do now. We need to stick together. That’s what Dad would have wanted.”
His gaze dropped to our joined hands, and his expression hardened before he pulled his hand away. “No, Beverly,” he said, his voice hollow and drained of the usual warmth I was used to. “That’s not what he would have wanted.”
I blinked at him, convinced I had misheard. “What?”
Blake stared at me for a long moment. Then he choked out, “He didn’t approve. He didn’t want us together. Not like this.”
I shook my head, refusing to accept it. “No. That’s not true.”
His gaze was empty. “It is. He said there’s no future for us.”
I swallowed past the ache rising in my throat.
“He said we were too young,” he continued, his voice flat, emotionless. “That we might hurt each other. That?—”
“But we won’t hurt each other?—”
“Beverly, the point is he didn’t want us together. He said it. I’m telling you what he told me, and you need to listen.”
I wanted to scream at him, shake him, force him to take it back. Instead, I shook my head. “That doesn’t change things.”
“It changes everything,” he hissed through gritted teeth, pointing at the gravestone. “And that’s the damn proof, Beverly.”
I flinched at the venom in his voice.
“No,” I whispered. “He didn’t mean it that way?—”
“He did,” Blake said bitterly, his face twisted in pain. “And…and he was right.”
My lips trembled. “You didn’t fight for us?”
“You have no idea how hard I fought.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean?—”
“Do not make me talk about this right now,” he interrupted, his voice strained. “It’s not important. Not after everything that’s happened.”
But it was important.
“I need you,” I choked out.
Blake looked away.
Something sharp and ugly rose in my throat. “Blake?—”
“Would you just stop it already?” His voice cracked. “Just—give me space, Beverly. Leave me alone. I—” He closed his eyes. “I need to be alone.”
Then he turned and walked away.
I watched him go, panic creeping into my bones.
He was just angry, I told myself.
He didn’t mean it.
He didn’t mean it.
But he didn’t stop.
And standing there, mere feet away from my dead father, a gaping hole in my chest, with no arms to wrap around me to make it better, I finally felt it. I felt the rupture. A wound so deep and so sudden that I wasn’t sure it would ever heal.
Because this wasn’t just losing my father.
This was losing Blake.
And that?
That felt like death, too.