Chapter 49
Chapter Forty-Nine
JAYSON
Seattle
Walking up the grassy hill, the little sculpted fairy princess comes into view, her arm outstretched as she reaches for a butterfly.
As soon as I see it, a soul-crushing heartache grips me.
I’ll never come to terms with losing her, this beautiful baby girl Liz and I created.
I feel the cruelty of her absence every fucking day.
I never got to meet her or hold her or kiss her sweet cheek and tell her that Daddy loves her.
All the cute laughs and gap-toothed smiles, all the milestones created as she grew up, were stolen from us.
Elizabeth Ann never got a chance to take her first breath.
Never got to live the life she was supposed to have because a psychopath decided to steal her soul.
The man responsible for so much death and pain was never caught. I still look for him—look for his heterochromatic eyes, one blue and one brown, Liz had told us—in every face I see. I will never stop looking.
“Hey. You okay?”
I look down at Liz’s concerned face. We came here as soon as we got off the plane.
“Yeah. I’m good.”
She glances skyward. “Think the rain will hold off?”
It wouldn’t matter anyway. Liz and I have weathered many rainy days on several of our annual visits to see Elizabeth Ann. A little rain won’t stop us from spending time with our girl.
“It’s Seattle,” I reply.
“True.” Liz smiles, and it’s like seeing the first rays of sunshine break through the thick gray clouds that hang above us.
Our footsteps slow when we get closer. Blooms of colorful flowers in various shades of yellows, blues, and purples create a beautiful watercolor canvas around the base of the granite pedestal that the statue stands upon.
Liz must have planted them when she was here in June.
It’s something we do…did…every year when we came.
“I like the flowers.”
Liz sets down her guitar and her large bag on the ground and takes out the quilted blanket.
“I decided to do indigos and yellows this year,” she says as I help her stretch the blanket out flat. Liz crouches in front of the headstone and kisses her fingertips, then touches Elizabeth Ann’s name. “Hey, baby girl, look who’s here.” Liz’s voice breaks just enough to unravel my guilt.
I hadn’t been here in three years. Three missed birthdays. Did she think I abandoned her? Didn’t love her anymore? I should’ve come sooner. It shouldn’t have taken me this long to get sober. I should have been stronger.
I drop to my knees on the damp grass. Wetness seeps through the fabric of my jeans, but I barely notice. My throat constricts as I read the “Butterfly Angel” poem carved into the placard of the statue.
…Even though you’ve been taken from me,
You go on. You breathe inside me…
My heart slowly bleeds out as each word slashes me like a paper cut, one after the other, until there are thousands. Even though I’ve read this poem a hundred times, it still knocks the breath out of me.
“I’m sorry,” I say hoarsely, my gaze fixed on the headstone.
Liz sits beside me and quietly places a supportive hand over my clenched fists. “She knows, Jayson.”
A single tear falls down my cheek, and then another, until the tears come fast, hot, and ugly.
The kind that you could drown in. “I should’ve been here.
But I was…lost. Drinking too much. Trying not to feel anything.
Hating myself. I broke my promise to you and your mom. I don’t know how to forgive myself.”
Liz’s arms band around me, her tears joining mine. “Her love is unconditional, and so is mine. We’re so proud of you, Jayson. So damn proud.”
I can only nod because the agony doesn’t lessen. I failed my daughters. Both of them.
Bending forward, I press my forehead to the headstone. Even though it’s cloudy, the stone is warm.
Looking up at the fairy princess, I whisper, “I love you, sweet girl.”
Liz takes out a trowel from her bag, along with a pair of gardening gloves.
“Did you bring one?”
“Yeah.” I reach into my back pocket and pull out three crumpled envelopes, one for each birthday I missed.
With slow, methodical movements, Liz digs up the weatherproof lockbox we buried next to the grave.
For every year we would come, we would add one letter each.
I don’t know what Liz writes to our daughter, but mine are usually filled with things I saw or did that I thought she’d like or about things I imagined we’d do together if she were alive.
Liz lifts the metal box from its hole and places it between us.
Wiping dirt from the latch, I unlock it and lift the lid. “We may have to get a bigger one,” I comment when a few letters spill out onto the ground.
Liz swiftly gathers the runaways before the strong breeze can carry them away. “We can pick up a new one tomorrow.”
She waits for me to add my letters before placing the one she brought on top.
“I have one more thing to add,” I say and slip my necklace over my head. The gold coin spins back and forth as it dangles from the chain.
I did it, Elizabeth Ann. With you to guide me back into the light, I did it. Thank you for never giving up on me.
I reach an arm around Liz and pull her close. Her head finds a resting place on my shoulder as we sit in silence, lost in our own thoughts.
“What do you think she would be doing now?” Liz asks.
We’ve imagined every permutation of what Elizabeth Ann’s life would be like. “Graduate school because she’d be smart like her mom.”
“Maybe planning her wedding to the amazing man who stole her heart.”
I groan. “She’s too young to be married.” Besides, no man would be good enough for my daughter.
Liz laughs and pokes my knee. “She’s twenty-four.”
Thinking about the decades we lost with her destroys me. No parent should ever outlive their child.
Mustering a smile that I absolutely do not feel, I reply, “Still too young. She can’t get married until she’s thirty. At least.”
“So, you’re one of those, huh?”
“One of what?”
“One of those dads who would threaten and intimidate any guy who asked her out.”
“Damn straight.”
Liz’s pretty, upturned face balks good-humoredly at me. “My dad never did that to you.”
“That’s because I’m awesome.”
“You still are,” she replies quietly, almost in a whisper.
My grin falls away as I stare into her pale-green eyes. I’m suddenly transported back to the first time I ever saw her. I was only six years old, but I knew…somehow I just knew …that I would love her forever.
Without my permission, my hand cradles her face, my fingers threading around the nape of her neck and into her hair. “You are so beautiful.”
A blush tints her cheeks, just as a single raindrop lands on the tip of her nose.
We look up.
Liz blinks as the next raindrop clings to her eyelashes—and then the clouds open up and release their burden all at once, drenching us within seconds.
Liz looks at me with wide eyes as the rain beats down on us, her hair plastered to her face in a long, wet curtain of wheat blonde, and her shirt stuck to her like a second skin.
Then she laughs. Not a shy chuckle, but a full-bodied, throw-her-head-back kind of laugh—bright, surprised, and carefree.
“Oh my god!” Standing up, she stretches her arms wide to the sky, not caring that her guitar and bag are getting drenched.
I can’t help but follow, pulled by the gravity of her joy. Her hands reach for mine, and she spins us around in a circle. I don’t know the steps, but I don’t need to. She leads, and I follow as we slip, laugh, and spin again.
Liz stumbles into me, and I catch her with an arm around her waist. Our arms slide around each other, and our movements turn into something softer, slower, our bodies pressing closer as we dance to the hush of the falling rain drumming like a soft percussion all around us.
“Fallon asked me to marry him,” she says against my chest.
I noticed in the tree that she had taken off her wedding rings.
My heart stumbles. The rain keeps falling.
But neither of us moves. Neither of us lets go.
Not yet.