Chapter 15 #2
“Good.” He kissed her forehead, then her mouth, slow and reassuring. “I’ll shower first, then I’ll get out of your hair. We’re supposed to meet with the mayor at eleven anyway.”
“Right.” She pushed herself up on her elbows. “Preliminary lease talk. Contractors. Adult stuff.”
“You say that like we didn’t already talk in bed about wiring a warehouse,” he said.
Her cheeks warmed. “That was different adult stuff.”
He grinned. “Both important.”
He slid out of bed and headed to the bathroom, pausing in the doorway to look back at her. “Call them, Bree. You don’t have to have every answer. Just tell them the truth.”
She nodded, fingers tight around her phone. “Yeah. Okay.”
The shower started; water hit the tile in a steady rush.
Bree opened her mom’s text and hit the call icon.
Her parents picked up on the second ring. That alone told her they had been waiting.
“Hi, honey,” her mom said. “How are you feeling? We watched the race on TV. Your dad kept yelling at the announcer.”
Her dad’s voice came faintly in the background. “He kept calling the corners by the wrong names.”
Bree smiled despite the nerves. “Hi, Mom. Hi, Dad. I’m okay. Hank’s okay. It was a big day.”
“So we saw,” her dad said, taking the phone from her mom by the sound of it. “That pass on the last lap. Damn, Bree. That was something.”
“I didn’t do anything except clutch my sketchbook and forget how to breathe,” she said. “Hank did the hard part.”
“You were there,” he said. “Counts for something.”
Her mom reclaimed the phone. “We heard there was some kind of cheating scandal,” she whispered. “Are you safe? Are you staying away from those people?”
“Yes,” Bree said quickly. “I’m safe. Copper Moon PD is on top of it. Sergeant Diaz could probably take down an entire biker gang with a look.”
Her mom made a doubtful sound. “I don’t like that you needed to find out.”
“None of us liked it,” Bree said. “But Hank did the right thing. He spoke up. They found the illegal equipment. Nobody got hurt.”
Not physically, anyway. She could still see the panic in Einstein’s face.
Her mom sighed. “All right. So long as you’re being careful.”
“I am.”
A beat of silence settled. Bree could hear the hum of the fridge at her parents’ house, the distant tick of the hallway clock that had been there since she was six.
“So,” her mom said. “When are you heading back?”
There it was.
Bree swallowed. “That’s kind of what I wanted to talk about.”
“Okay,” her dad said. His tone shifted; sturdy, prepared. “What’s up?”
She walked to the window and pushed the curtain aside. The boardwalk stretched below; the Cup banner still fluttered. Down near the fountain, a kid chased a bubble that had drifted free from a street vendor’s wand.
“I think I want to stay,” she said. “In Copper Moon. For a while. Longer than we talked about.”
Silence.
Her mom recovered first. “Stay how long?”
“I don’t have an exact date,” Bree said. “But Hank’s looking at opening a performance shop here. And there’s space above it that would make a perfect studio. I stood in it yesterday, and for the first time since Bryn died, I could actually picture myself working somewhere that wasn’t temporary.”
Her dad cleared his throat. “This is about the racer?”
“It’s about the town,” she said quietly. “And the racer. And me. I came here to hide and figure out if I could still paint. Instead, I found a place that feels like I can grow something. With him, yes. But also for myself. We're together. Seeing if it works.”
Her mom’s voice was soft and worried. “You’re not coming home.”
“I’m not saying never,” Bree said. “You two are still my home. But I think… I think I need a home that doesn’t feel like a memorial service all the time.
Every corner of the house has a ghost. Every street reminds me of driving behind the hearse.
I’ve been living there like I’m waiting for someone to hand me a script for how to move on, and it turns out the pages might be in a different town. ”
She waited, heart pounding.
Her dad exhaled slowly. “You know we only kept it that way because we thought it helped you,” he said. “We were afraid changing anything would erase her.”
“I know,” Bree said. “And I love you for that. But she’s not in the throw blanket on the couch or in the shoes by the door. She’s in us. And she’s in what we do with the fact that we’re still here.”
Her mom made a small, strangled sound.
“Mom?” Bree asked.
“I’m all right,” her mom said after a second. “Your father is patting my shoulder like I’m about to collapse, and I’m not. I’m just… hearing you.”
“I’m not running away from Bryn,” Bree said. “I’m trying to carry her somewhere new. I want to use some of the insurance money for the studio. For a series about her. I want people who never knew her to see pieces of her in my work.”
Her dad cleared his throat again, rougher this time. “She’d like that,” he said. “She hated that you hadn’t painted her yet.”
Bree laughed through the tightness in her throat. “She kept saying she wanted to sit for me when she ‘felt less like a raccoon.’ Her words.”
“She always stayed up too late,” her mom said, voice thick. “You really think you can be happy there?”
“I think I can try,” Bree said. “And if it turns out I was wrong, I’ll figure it out. But right now, when I picture the future, it’s not a cliff anymore. It’s a road. And Hank’s on it. And so are you, just... at a different mile marker.”
More silence. Not empty this time; full of things they were both turning over.
“Will we get to meet this Hank properly?” her mom asked at last.
“If you want to,” Bree said. “He’d like that.”
“Good,” her dad said. “If he’s keeping our girl in one piece, I want to shake his hand.”
Bree’s eyes burned. “He’s trying. So am I.”
“We know,” her mom said. “We just worry. It’s our hobby.”
Bree smiled, breath catching. “I’ll come back for a visit soon. Maybe after we know more about the lease and the timing. We're meeting with the mayor this morning to go over details. I can show you pictures of the warehouse.”
“Send some today,” her dad said. “I want to see this place where my daughter suddenly discovered gravity.”
“That’s not how gravity works,” Bree said reflexively.
“Art people,” he muttered to her mom. “Always nitpicking the metaphors.”
Her mom laughed, shaky but real. “We love you, Bree.”
“I love you too,” Bree said. “Tell Bryn hi for me at the cemetery. I know that’s not how it works, but… just do it.”
“We always do,” her mom said. “Call after your meeting with the mayor, okay? We want to hear.”
“I will. And I'd love for you to come here and see the place. Do you remember all the things Bryn used to say about Copper Moon?” She swallowed the knot in her throat. "She was right. It's all she said and more."
Her father's voice was gruff when he responded. "That's a good idea. That's probably why you feel you need to be there..." He took a deep breath. "She loved it so much, you can feel her there."
"I absolutely can. At every turn, I remember something she said about the area. I see and feel her everywhere here."
Her mom sobbed quietly, but she could still hear her. Her dad scoffed, "That's good. Yeah, good."
They disconnected. Bree stood there for a moment, phone pressed to her chest, letting the relief and the ache wrestle it out.
The bathroom door opened; Hank stepped out with a towel around his hips, hair damp, another towel slung over his shoulder. She appreciated, briefly and thoroughly, the way his muscles moved under his skin when he scrubbed at his hair.
“How’d it go?” he asked.
She sat on the edge of the bed. “They didn’t have a heart attack, so that’s a win. They’re worried, but they’re listening. My dad wants pictures. My mom wants to meet you.”
He smiled. “I like them already.”
“He also wants to make sure you’re not a flighty jerk.”
“Reasonable concern.”
“He didn’t use those exact words, but it was implied.”
Hank crossed the room and tipped her chin up with one finger. “You okay?” he asked.
She nodded. “Scared. Relieved. Some weird combination of both.”
“That’s usually where the good changes start,” he said. “You were brave. I’m proud of you.”
The word proud slid under her ribs and settled there. “Don’t you dare make me cry. I have a meeting with the mayor, and I don’t want to go in with puffy eyes.”
He brushed his thumb under one eye anyway. “I like your eyes,” he said. “Puffy or not.”
She rolled hers. “You’re impossible.”
“Accurate.” He paused. “We’ve got about forty minutes before we need to head out. You want breakfast, or you want me to distract your brain for a while?”
Her gaze dropped briefly to the strip of skin between his towel and his hip.
“Why not both?” she said.
His laugh was low and pleased. “Yes, ma’am.”
An hour later, showered, dressed, and only slightly late, they walked hand in hand toward the civic building where the mayor’s office lived. Hank carried a folder with notes he’d scribbled on hotel stationery; Bree carried her sketchbook because she felt naked without it.
The morning sun had burned through most of the haze, leaving Copper Moon sharp and bright. Workers swept up confetti and paper cups from the previous night’s celebrations. The Cup banner hung a little crooked now; someone would fix it later.
“Okay,” Bree said as they climbed the steps. “Game plan.”
“Listen more than we talk,” Hank said. “Ask about terms, timeline, and what improvements the city will cover for code compliance. We keep options open. We sign nothing without reading every page twice.”
“Look at you,” she said. “Responsible adult.”
“Don’t spread it around,” he said. “I’ve got a reputation to maintain.”
Inside, the building smelled of old paper and lemon cleaner. The receptionist greeted them by name and pointed them toward a conference room.