Chapter 20
Chapter Twenty
Brody
When I was eight, I almost died.
I’d been skating at the local pond by myself and fell through a patch of thin ice. Ironic for a hockey player, I know, but that’s how it happened.
I’d loved the ice in a way that none of my family did, and sometimes I just went out there to be on my own. The house could get hectic with a bunch of sisters and two loud and bold parents filling up all that space.
With a house that full, it was easy for me to just slip away unnoticed. And I needed the quiet sometimes. To think about my own thoughts and figure shit out.
When I was around too many people, it was too easy to let myself get swept away. I was the kid who made people laugh. The one who lightened the mood when life got too heavy. And I was good at it.
But sometimes, it just felt like a role I played. When I came to skate, I sort of got to figure out who I was. What I loved to do. Without pressure from anyone to be anything different than what I was.
If I’d told my mom where I was going, it wouldn’t be mine anymore. It would be another thing I had to share with my sisters.
I wanted this time for me, so I never told my mom where I was going. But when I fell through that patch of ice, I regretted not sharing it more than anything. Not telling anyone about my dreams.
It was cold, but that wasn’t even the worst part. No, the frigid temperature numbed me until it nearly burned.
What was worse was the panic. The helplessness. When you fall through the ice, no one tells you about how the current moves you until you’re so far from where you fell in, you can’t even find the opening above you anymore.
I was flailing under the water, losing my goddamn mind as I slammed against a layer of ice thicker than concrete, and I remember thinking, No one knows I’m here. I’m all alone. No one is coming to save me.
But, you know what?
I’d been a goddamn idiot, because it turned out they knew the whole time. That’s what they told me after.
Because my dad came out running just a minute after I fell through. He shoved a branch through the hole I’d made, and I latched onto it with the last of the life I had in me.
My sister Tara had been there too, standing behind him, crying. I guess someone always came to watch me skate, but no one ever told me.
They thought I was embarrassed about it or something. Said they didn’t want to discourage me from something I loved.
After that, I never lied to my family again. Sure, they could be annoying and overbearing. Sometimes they were loud. Sometimes I could get lost in the role of brother or son or jokester. But they loved me. And I loved them.
I could put aside the rest.
But the pain, the terror from falling through the ice that day? I never forgot that moment. And I never thought I’d ever feel a bone-deep ache like that again.
But I’d been wrong.
Because this? It was a thousand times worse.
“She said no?” Cassie asked, covering her mouth to stifle a gasp. “Are you sure?”
“Pretty damn sure,” I muttered, letting my head drop into my arms as I leaned over their countertop. “I think I’m going to be sick.”
“Maybe we should move this conversation to the bathroom, then?” Liam muttered, flipping a pancake.
“Be more sensitive, Liam,” Cassie scolded.
“Yeah,” I said, head still down on the counter. “Listen to your wife.”
“What?” I heard Liam say. “I’m just saying better be sick there than the place our daughter is eating breakfast.”
I turned my head sideways on the smooth countertop to peek at Lily sitting beside me.
“Want some pancakes, Uncle Brody?” she smiled, face streaked with syrup as she held a forkful up to my mouth.
I groaned and turned my head back face-down.
“It’s okay, Lil,” Cassie said. “Uncle Brody’s not feeling well right now.”
“Maybe ’cause he’s hungry,” she suggested.
“I’m not hungry,” I answered.
“His heart is a little hurt right now, Lil. But he’ll be okay,” Cassie said.
“Why’s his heart hurt, Mommy?”
“Because he didn’t get something he really wanted,” Cassie said carefully. “Remember how we talked about that big word disappointed?”
“Mhm,” Lily said. “Uncle Brody’s feeling disa-diss-ponted and now his heart is hurting?”
“Right,” Cassie agreed.
“Maybe we can put a Princess band-aid on it?” she suggested.
“We can try,” Cassie said, and I heard Lily jump off the stool while she and Cass went in search of an adhesive cure for my heartbreak.
“This is a new brand of misery,” I groaned, lifting my head to look at Liam, who was putting the rest of the pancakes on a plate.
“What?”
“Having to listen to my suffering be dissected to a three-year-old.”
“That’s what you get when you show up on our doorstep at six thirty in the morning.”
“Hey,” I protested weakly. “I was here at five, but at least I had the decency to wait until the sun came up.”
I didn’t have it in me to crack a joke, even though I knew that I’d be expected to smile in spite of my heart shattering. Because that’s what I did, wasn’t it? I picked up and carried on, no matter what.
But this was different. This was life-altering. Earth-shattering. I didn’t know how I’d ever be able to carry on again.
Not without Maggie.
“I’m sorry, Brody,” Liam said, staring at me with a rare expression of sincerity. “Really, I am.”
“Don’t be sorry,” I said. “It’s not your fault.”
“What happened?” he asked. “It doesn’t make sense.”
I didn’t want to talk about it, because talking about it would make it feel real. I just wanted to close my eyes and keep it all out, and hope that maybe I’d wake up in bed beside Maggie with the whole thing having been a warning, prophetic dream.
“I don’t know,” I admitted, groaning into my hands.
And that was the worst part. I really didn’t.
“Did she never love me?” I asked.
“She loves you,” Liam confirmed.
I thought she did. I knew she did.
Just maybe not enough.
“Then why did she say no?”
“You know her as well as I do.” Liam shrugged. “Maggie’s… complicated. Unpredictable. She doesn’t like to be boxed into a corner, and I think maybe she’s just running scared.”
“So, maybe she just needs time?” I asked hopefully. “A little bit of space? I mean, once she thinks it over, she’ll realize that it was a mistake, right?”
Liam grimaced, pain written all over his expression as he stared at me with what felt like pity.
I hated pity. I didn’t want it. It meant he wasn’t going to give me that spark of hope I was so desperate for.
One thing about Liam was, he would never let me live in delusion. Even when I wished he would.
“Listen, man,” he said carefully. “She’s my sister, and I love her.” He paused. “But you’re my best friend, and if I’m being honest, I can’t tell you to wait around for a train that might never come.”
And there it was. My hope deflated, chest aching at the realization of his words.
Maggie always knew what she wanted and went like hell to go after it. But this time, what she wanted—it just wasn’t me.
“Fuck,” I said, tears finally escaping my eyes.
This was real. There was no undoing it. No going back.
The door swung open, and Lily bounded back into the kitchen, holding up a band-aid with a sense of urgency as she rushed toward me.
Cassie followed behind, eyes looking red and puffy as she trailed behind her daughter. I watched Liam clock her mood and maneuver around the counter to be by her side in an instant.
If anyone had asked me five years ago who out of the two of us would be married first, I would’ve bet every last dollar in my bank account that it would be me.
I actually wanted it. A wife. A family. Liam couldn’t have cared less about it. Not until Cassie.
I had a strange pang of jealousy seeing him live the life I envisioned having with his sister. A dream that had been ripped away from me before I even had a chance to see it slipping away.
“Here, Uncle Brody,” Lily said, staring up at me with wide, innocent eyes. “I got this to make you better.”
“Thanks, kiddo,” I said, forcing myself to smile down at her.
“I’m gonna put it right here, okay?” she said, before placing the band-aid on my chest, right on the fabric of my shirt. “Because your heart is in here and this will make it better.”
My throat felt hollow, stomach twisted. Everything hurt. I had a feeling everything would always hurt now. I better get used to it.
“Thanks, Lil,” I said, but she interrupted me with a kiss on top of the band-aid.
“You’ll be better now, because when someone who loves you kisses your boo-boo, it makes it all better. Right, Mommy?” She turned, and I followed her gaze to see a sniffling Cassie, as Liam stood with his arm around her.
“Right, baby,” Cassie nodded.
“And I love you, Uncle Brody,” Lily confirmed, turning her green eyes back to me. Green eyes like Maggie’s.
“I love you, too, Lil,” I told her. “Thanks for fixing my heart.”
I lied for her sake. I knew there was nothing left to fix.