Chapter 56
Jake
While I’m not sure that a sunset has ever made me cry, I completely understand the feelings that Scarlett is going through.
Sometimes the beauty of this life forces you to take a step back and see the path that got you here.
It almost seems like it pushes you to the brink in order to see the strength and the persistence that you have.
The tenacity that keeps you here. These little moments of appreciation make all the day in and day out work worth it.
The first time I experienced a night like this was about a month after Dad died.
I was wrestling with the idea of keeping my word to Dad or going back to California.
I had spent the last month getting the farm’s finances in order plus fixing multiple things that I would have to fix before selling, if that’s what I decided to do.
All that work was harder than anything I was used to with my desk job back in Cali.
My back ached, my muscles were sore all over my body and I sat out on the back porch with a glass of whiskey.
It was a rare day with zero wind and the temperature was just right. I watched the sun set behind the mountain and gazed up at the sky as each star appeared. All the while inside my mind was a running tab of pros and cons.
Staying meant giving up my life on the west coast. Giving up my proximity to the ocean.
Giving up any friendship I’d made out there.
Which when I thought about it, wasn’t many.
I had what I know now were acquaintances.
People who I thought were friends but really the relationships were surface level.
We all worked together and knew the basics.
Who was married or not, who had children, who would be down for a beer after work, who would want to meet on Sundays for a beach workout.
But I couldn’t really tell you anything deeply personal about any of them.
Going back to California meant trading my last promise to my dad for a fancy job and extremely high rent for an apartment I didn’t even really like.
But staying here meant I had no idea what my future looked like.
Would I get married here? Have a family?
Would I get tired of the farm life and regret not going back?
Would it be too late to go back if I decided to go a few years down the road?
Surely it would be too late to go back to the firm I currently worked for but there would be other opportunities.
My mind swirled with back and forths until I laid my head back on the adirondack chair I sat in.
For a minute I tried to just sit in that moment right there.
Not think too far ahead, not relive the past, just be.
I stared up at the sky spotting constellations I used to know by heart as a kid and now I’d forgotten the name of.
I let the massiveness of the universe hover over me and show me just how small I really was.
And right there in the middle of the sky was the biggest shooting star I’d ever seen.
It didn’t feel like a blip of light, it felt like it moved across the sky in slow motion, creating a tail behind it so large it was impossible not to notice.
It was right then that I put away the pros and cons and asked myself just one question.
Could I live the rest of my life knowing that every night I’d be trading my apartment ceiling for this night sky?
Turns out the answer was an immediate no.
That next morning I called the real estate agent and told him nevermind, I was no longer interested in talking to him about selling the farm.
As I hold Scarlett now, I hear her sniffle softly against my chest and I know that she’s feeling the same way I did that night. She’s feeling that whole body relief that comes with sore muscles and a sense of contentment.
“Here sugar, let’s sit down,” I say, putting my hands on her shoulders to gently pull her away.
She sniffles again and wipes at the bottom of her eyes before she looks up at me.
Those blue-green eyes of hers are darker out here as the sun sets.
The tears have made them glassy and it makes my heart ache to see them, even if they are happy tears.
I leave one arm wrapped around her as I guide her up to the porch. I scoot two chairs as close together as I can, making sure that they are pulled out from the overhang. Scarlett takes a seat in one, wiping the tears from her eyes again and I join her in the next one.
“I don’t know the last time that I loved my life this much,” she says.
I nod, giving her plenty of space and silence to continue if she needs to.
“I mean, I think the last time might have been when I started my job right out of college. My boss was so cool. He was this older guy who you could just tell had been through some shit. You know?” She looks to me for confirmation, I nod my head reassuring her that I do know what she means.
“He was a reporter during Vietnam and he witnessed so many tragedies. But, you know what was so awesome about him? Seeing those things made him appreciate life instead of letting it drown him. He used what he saw as motivation to make the world a better place. And while life was still hectic with him as my boss, it got so much worse when Valerie took over. She’s scatterbrained.
She lives inside a cloud of anxiety and that’s a lot coming from me.
I swear I used to get a physical reaction whenever she came around. ”
“I get a physical reaction when you come around too,” I say with a smirk. She smacks my chest lightly and smiles. It’s small, but it’s genuine. I can feel her coming back to me.
“Work would have been much more interesting if I got that type of physical reaction to her. But no, it was like a chest tightening, arms itching, my body rejecting her presence-type of reaction. During one particularly stressful time period I legitimately developed hives. My therapist saw me scratching and convinced me that my anxiety had reached a whole new level and that I needed to get that shit under control before it turned into a heart attack in my thirties. The more I stepped back and set boundaries, the more Valerie would do things to make my life hell. Like ask me where an article was that was apparently due that day but I had never heard her ask me to write it. And I swear to God there were a few times when I would throw together an article in a hurry and then she would call it trash and not publish it. After a few times I realized she was just fucking with me. Valerie was the push I needed to see that I really wasn’t enjoying the life I had set out to have anymore. ”
“Well I appreciate her push,” I say, putting my hand on top of hers.
“I feel like for the last several years I’ve been out here following someone else’s path and wondering why.
I think you were why. This farm, this was my dad’s dream.
Sure I helped growing up, for a few years until my mom split.
Then I saw it as the reason why she left and I resented it and him.
Once I learned the truth it was too late.
That resentment was too ingrained in my DNA.
On his deathbed he asked me to stay. To take over the farm and do what he couldn’t, make it successful.
I promised him I would because what else do you say to someone on their deathbed?
Eventually I decided that the best thing for me was to stay but I’d be lying if I said I felt content or fulfilled.
Now that you’re here though, I feel like maybe I was always meant to be here, waiting for you.
” I didn’t plan to say that. It just came out.
Listening to her talk about her old job and her old life and how it didn’t fulfill her and now she feels better than ever, makes me think about how I feel exactly the same.
I have been going through the motions for years.
Amelia and Cami make fun of me for my rigid habitual schedule of chores but without it I would have lost my mind by now.
Since Scarlett arrived, my schedule has been thrown off but in the best way possible.
I don’t need that rigid routine because I don’t dread the monotony of the chores that need to be done.
Lately we’ve been working together and Scarlett makes the chores fun.
She makes the time I spend out there feel worth it again.