25. Millie
CHAPTER 25
Millie
I fasten the final button on the flannel Caden pulled from his backpack and turn back towards the truck, stumbling through leaves and broken branches as I go.
I couldn’t convince myself to get changed out in the open, which seems ridiculous, given that I’ve shown Caden some of the most vulnerable, naked parts of myself over the past few weeks. I highly doubt seeing me standing in my underwear, with all of my flaws on show, could be any worse for him than seeing the crazy, bawling, stuttering moments of panic he’s had to endure recently. I had him pinned as a grumpy, antisocial moron, with the emotional intelligence of rock, but he’s been the one person who keeps showing up. Giving me exactly what I need, at exactly the right time, without a second thought.
His kindness has come so effortlessly.
The original picture I built up of him in my head is slowly crumbling at the edges.
He’s turned the tailgate into a make-shift breakfast bar, flipped down and laid out with mismatched mugs filled with frothy hot chocolate, a handful of granola bars, slices of cooked ham and a Tupperware filled with hazelnut spread.
Interesting .
“I just grabbed what we had,” Caden explains, letting embarrassment coat his features. “I wasn’t expecting guests, otherwise I’d have swung past Stella’s yesterday.”
“Not at all,” I reply, grateful for the snack now that my belly is rumbling. “I actually happen to be partial to spreading chocolate on my ham. It’s my favourite way to start the morning.”
He scoffs at my sarcasm.
The early morning sky has gradually been descending through the colour chart, changing from obsidian to navy on the drive here, and now sitting somewhere closer to indigo.
“You’ll probably want to ditch the shoes,” Caden states, dropping a pair of ridiculously large flip-flops at my feet.
I slip off my sheepskin lined boots, hopping around on one foot as I remove my socks and stuff them inside. Caden catches the corner of my eye, shaking his head as he unties the canoe from the truck bed.
I look ridiculous – like a much shorter, much curvier version of Caden. I don’t fill out his clothes quite right. The same flannel shirt that perfectly holds his frame falls just above my knees and barely buttons over my chest. Yet, some part of me secretly likes being wrapped in these clothes that belong to him, even with the obvious sizing issue.
I take tiny steps towards the water’s edge, my toes clinging to the silicone base of the flip-flops, hoping to keep them on my feet.
“What size are these? And did they once in fact belong to a behemoth?” I ask.
“They’re a thirteen.” Caden laughs. “I don’t know if I’d call myself a behemoth, but I’ll leave you to be the judge of my size.”
“Excuse me?” I splutter.
“I said I’m a size thirteen,” he smirks, knowing exactly what he’s just said and where it sent my thoughts. “My feet, Adams. We’re talking about feet.”
“Right.” I nod, begging my mind to think of Caden’s feet and nothing else.
I thought I’d seen Doug in his cutest form, but that was before I’d seen him in a life jacket. He looks adorable right now, snuggled up in the middle of the canoe, completely at ease. It’s hard to believe that this hasn’t always been his life. Elodie told me that Caden found him one day abandoned on the side of the highway, he brought him back to Braggan Valley with no idea if he’d make it, given how down and emaciated he was. Life hadn’t treated him kindly, but Caden showed up and chose to stay.
“Here!” Caden calls. I duck out of the way of a low flying object, realizing all too late that it’s my own life jacket. He tuts, brushing past me to pick the jacket up off the ground and dust it off.
“I can swim, you know. I don’t need this.” I gesture to the garish orange flotation device.
“In that water?” He raises a brow as he pulls the jacket over my head. “No chance. You’ll go into shock before you even have half a chance to call for help. I’m not taking that risk. No PFD, no canoe. Got it?”
“Uch, fine,” I relent, throwing the lifejacket on and fumbling with the straps and zippers, trying to work out how to fasten myself in. You’d think they’d consider making safety gear like this easier to use if we’re expected to wear it.
“Let me help you,” Caden offers.
“I’m fine,” I blurt, my little-miss-independent act rearing its head again. “I’ve got this.”
He doesn’t argue, leaning back against the tree in front of me, his arms folded over his chest as he watches me struggle.
This went a lot better in my head.
I’ve got myself tied up in knots, clips in all the wrong places, and I can't seem to reach around the back far enough to untwist the waist strap.
I feel like I’m suffocating – wrapped up in string like a pork roast at the grocery store.
“Still doing fine, Adams?” His trademark smirk spreads across his face.
“A little less than fine,” I confess, throwing my arms down by my side in frustration. “Can I reconsider your offer?”
He makes his way back over to me, loosening all of my handy work and pulling the jacket off my shoulders, rotating it 180 degrees before feeding it back over my arms.
I had it on upside down. Great.
He’s standing all too close as he pulls the zipper up over my chest. Taking his time with each clip, he secures me in the vest like I’m precious cargo.
“As you can see,” he gestures to the canoe, where Doug has already fallen back into slumber, “I don’t get into the habit of taking the things I care about out on the water without making sure they’re safe first. ”
He pulls the final strap taut around my waist with one hand, my body stumbling toward him as he runs his fingers over each fastening, ensuring they’re in place.
“Perfect,” he affirms, his eyes holding mine for just a second before he makes his way towards the canoe. “Let’s go.”
I follow after him silently, my chest momentarily robbed of air.
The morning is silent as we push off from the rocky shoreline, save for the soft ripples of our paddles moving through the turquoise water.
When I say we , I really mean Caden.
He’s fully in control of this voyage. I’ve barely let my paddle touch the surface.
I’m captivated by the way the jagged peaks cast shadows over the lake, splitting it into two entirely different shades of blue. Behind the mountains, the sun is slowly lighting up the sky, wispy clouds melting into the morning in swathes of pink and orange.
There’s something almost ethereal about being out here on the lake with nobody else around. Just two humans and a dog, sharing this corner of the earth with nature as dawn welcomes another day. My worries are a little further away, it’s like they can’t quite reach me out here. The gentle sway of the morning waves mixed with Doug’s rhythmic exhales is the perfect soundtrack, there’s no need to fill awkward silences or scramble to find things to talk about.
We get to just be .
Caden offered to take me home this morning, said he’d turn the truck around right there and then, drop me back at the lodge if that’s what I needed. But I didn’t want to go home, and he didn’t press the issue, just hopped back in the driver’s seat and carried on towards the parking lot.
I’m grateful for that. It’s not often people trust you to know your mind, and let you have your way when you’re in the midst of your own chaos.
We fell into ordinary conversation about ordinary things. He told me about his sister, Josie, and her ‘punk-ass man-child’ of a boyfriend, his old life firefighting back in BC, and that one year Doug dragged the Turkey off the table when Maura wasn’t looking and ruined Christmas dinner. His stories turned the tears brimming in my eyes into ones filled with laughter.
“It’s beautiful, huh?” Caden’s velveteen voice breaks through my thoughts.
“So beautiful,” I muse. “The clouds look like cotton candy. Like a painting… but it’s real, it’s right there.”
“Mhmm,” he hums. “I don’t know that a painting could ever fully do it justice.”
He’s right.
This is the sort of place that needs to be felt.
“Thanks for bringing me out here.” I sigh softly. “You don’t know how much I’ve been needing something like this.”
He’s silent for a beat, letting my words rest between us.
“You wanna talk about it?” He drags his paddles through the water, pushing us a little further into the lake. “Either to me, or to the water? I always find that this place brings a little healing.”
I run my fingers through the opaque ripples, wondering if there is some magic to all of this.
Maybe it’s because we’re out here in this safe haven, away from reality, or because he’s been so selflessly kind recently, but I feel like opening up to Caden. Even though I hardly know him, it feels like trusting him would be the easiest thing in the world.
I want to give him my truth, I want to let him in. I just don’t know where to begin. I’ve carried this around for so long that I don’t even know where the hurt starts and I end. It’s all so intertwined within me, buried and blended into the essence of who I am, that some days I feel like I can’t separate myself from those dark moments. All I’ve ever known is what I’ve been through, and its endless aftermath.
“My dad was kind of fucked up.” A tiny laugh bursts out of me. It’s the understatement of the decade. It’s like I’m programmed to make light of everything that happened, using humour as the chaser for a reality that’s too hard to swallow. “He’s been dead seven years, and I still can’t seem to move on. I’m still so stuck.”
“He was fucked up? In what way?”
“He was a doctor, well-respected in the community, forever doing the right thing for the world to see. You’d think we had the perfect life, but behind closed doors, it was completely different. We lived in a broken home, but the kind where the cracks are on the inside – ones you’d only notice if you were really paying attention.”
I pause, waiting for him to fill the silence, to end the conversation, or sugar coat it with a positive anecdote. But he doesn’t.
“Mom tried to leave so many times, but men like that know what they’re doing – they chip away at every part of you until you can’t trust your own thoughts. They make you think you’ll be nothing without them. I think she was scared that leaving him would be worse for us.”
It’s not until I wipe my cheek that I realize I’m crying.
“Nobody noticed, or if they did, they turned a blind eye. The older I get, the more I think it’s the latter. We had the bruises, the excuses that didn’t make sense. My grades slipped, Maddie was constantly acting out – but still, nobody asked. For years we stayed and hurt at the hands of my father, until the day he died. That should’ve been our chance to move on, to start afresh free from the hell of him. But even now, I can’t seem to move on – my mind keeps pulling me back into that old life, asking me to remember.”
“Millie, I’m so sorry.” Caden’s voice is tight. “Is that why you moved out here to Braggan Valley? To get away from it all?”
“Mhmm.” I nod. “I came out here thinking a new place might give me a fresh start, that I’d have a chance to move on from these stupid dreams, and the flashbacks, and all of this unshakeable sadness within me.” I feel my throat tighten around the words. “I wrote this silly list of things I wanted to do when I got here – thinking I’d be able to throw myself into life in the mountains without carrying the weight of this around with me. I just wanted to hike, swim in lakes, and ride horseback with the wind in my hair. I wanted to feel free… I thought I would feel free. But instead, I’m scared to allow myself to feel the sun on my face for fear that the darkness is just waiting on the sidelines to come and take it away.”
I suck in a breath, feeling shame roll over me. All Caden wanted this morning was to come out here and enjoy a peaceful sunrise with Doug, instead he’s had to listen to me offloading all of my trauma like a bloody dump truck.
“I think you’re brave.”
“What?” I’d call myself many things. Naive? Maybe. Hopeless? Definitely . But never brave.
“I think you’re brave,” he repeats. “You’ve clearly been through a lot, and I don’t even know the half of it. I’m just hearing what you tell me, and I’m sure you’re holding back on the worst of it. Yet, you still chose to come out here. You still chose to believe there was some good in the world, and that you were going to try and find it for yourself. Don’t you think that’s brave?”
“God, what sort of drugs are in this water?” I joke, in a fruitless attempt to diffuse all of the pent-up emotion within me. “You’ve seen me break down far too many times already this summer.”
“You don’t have to hide yourself from me, Millie.” Caden’s voice is strained. “I care about you – every part of you. And I don’t want you to hide from me.”
He cares about me?
Those words feel like a comfort I haven’t done enough to deserve.
“I just wish he’d chosen to be a better man, you know.” I move my paddle through the water, giving my hands something to do as raw emotion coats my words. “There were tiny moments where I thought there was still some good in him. I’d cling to those moments so tightly – the odd warm embrace, chinks of pride when I did something right, a night of drinking that didn’t end in violence. But those moments were always short lived. He’d return to the reality of who he was soon enough, and I’d be robbed again of the father I deserved. That’s the part I find hardest to let go of. I think there’s still a little girl inside of me who holds so tightly to the could-have-beens.”
Caden doesn’t speak, as though he knows there’s more I need to say.
“They say time heals all wounds, but I’m not sure it’s healing mine at all. If anything, I’m getting worse.” I pick at the ragged skin around my thumb. “I’m still so angry . I’m angry for that little girl and the childhood she didn’t get, and I’m angry that after everything he’s done, he’s still hurting me now. I’m angry that all I know of love is heartbreak, and that I learned it from the man who was supposed to love me the most. I’m just so angry.”
I let the tears fall, and as they do, I realize it’s not anger I’m feeling at all. It’s raw, unrelenting agony. Devastating loss burning through the foundations of my heart, tearing all of those moments away from me. It’s all of the things I wanted disintegrating, falling around me and leaving me behind in the ash, because they were never mine to hold.
That kind of love was never meant for me.