Fourteen - What Matters
FOURTEEN
WHAT MATTERS
SEVENTY-FOUR, SEVENTY-FIVE, SEVENTY-SIX .
The numbers are bold-faced and huge, filling up my mind with each stroke of the brush against Ruin’s coat. His warm flank helps the most, though, anchoring me in the moment, in the motion. Better than any meditation app or breathing technique I’ve ever tried.
Seventy-seven, seventy-eight.
The rhythm becomes its own kind of white noise, overly loud in my mind but needed, drowning out the echoes of the past four days.
Of Mom’s disappointment, of PR’s attempts at weaponizing my humanity.
And the hollow ping of Eli’s messages, from that night and since.
Got more texts from him these last few days than actual spoken words.
Nope, don’t go there. We’re just brushing, no tears needed.
Seventy-nine.
Just me and my horse and this brush. In our little bubble where nothing else matters .
Ruin stands perfectly still, one hind leg cocked in relaxation, eyes half-closed. Leaning into the pressure of the brush, seeking more contact rather than less. He loves this. Makes me smile. Makes me come here more often, knowing I can make him happy with so little.
I need happiness. Even if it’s not my own.
Eighty-three, eighty-four, eighty-five.
Four days of Eli sleeping at his mother’s house instead of his room down the deck from mine.
Four days of seeing him only during structured training sessions, where he maintains a careful, professional distance that feels and echoes like a chasm between us.
Four days of wondering if what we had was ever real at all, or just another performance I convinced myself was authentic.
Ninety-two, ninety-three, ninety-four.
No, I can’t go down that hole again. Can’t let the cracks in my heart trick me into believing I was just naive, believing what I wanted to believe out of loneliness or whatever else.
It was all real. What I feel right now is real.
I get the distance. I get why he feels he needs to back off. It’s in the very DNA of this place—a life built on goodbyes, like Momma told me. But it doesn’t change anything.
It’s how I know it’s for real.
This love… It’s the truest thing I’ve ever felt.
Ruin’s ears twitch, picking up on something from down the hall.
A moment later, I hear it too—footsteps approaching, the distinctive cadence my body recognizes before my brain does.
My muscles immediately relax, a pulse of warmth radiating from chest to jaw to the tips of my fingers and toes.
Then receding even colder, a wave from the beach called back into the ocean when I remember.
When my heart calls bullshit because it didn’t crack itself.
I don’t turn around. Keep counting instead .
Ninety-eight, ninety-nine, one hundred.
One hundred.
One hundred.
Don’t cry. It was all real, so don’t cry.
“Hey.”
Just one word from him, and my stupid heart takes it all back. Not bullshit, all is well, back to business. A steadying breath, and I turn around, intent on feigning casual surprise and immediately dropping the act. Don’t have the energy.
Eli stands just outside the gate, hands shoved into the pockets of his worn jeans, shoulders slightly hunched in that way that shaves height and age off him.
A small boy, hoping it’s all right that he’s here.
The sight of him—solid and real and right there—makes my throat tighten.
We don’t have anything scheduled for today, so all I was hoping for was an evening text where he checks in and I lie about being okay, and that’d be it.
Him being here this early in the morning… He came to find me on purpose.
It’s when I notice he’s holding something, a plastic container pressed against his side by an elbow.
“Hey,” I echo.
He shifts his weight, eyes darting to Ruin, then back to me, then off again. “Momma made extra orange sponge,” he says, slipping the container from under his arm and handing it over. “Asked me to bring you some.”
The words take me a second to process, to penetrate the numbness. When they do, something warm and fragile unfurls in my chest.
Momma…sent cake for me? My favorite?
“She remembered?” My voice comes out so soft, but… It’s just because… I don’t know. Eli’s obviously drifting away, so I thought… That maybe she wouldn’t…
Fuck. I bite my lip, turn my back to him to set the brush on the far wall, just for those extra seconds. My eyes blink all they can while he’s not looking, trying to get the hotness back in. When I turn to him again, my skin feels a bit more solid, harder, dead enough to face him.
The corner of Eli’s mouth lifts in that barely-there smile that does stupid things to my insides.
“She remembers what matters,” he says simply as I walk back and take the container from him, being careful so our fingers don’t accidentally brush.
My eyes catch the heart around my wrist scar.
Still there. From the last time he touched me.
The last time.
“Thanks,” I mumble, not trusting my voice with anything more complex.
I unlatch the gate, and he gives me space—a whole lot of it—as I sit on the hay bale set against the stall wall, balancing the container on my knees.
It’s still warm, the plastic lid slightly fogged with condensation.
When I pop it open, the scent knocks me out—sweet orange and vanilla and a moment in time I know I’ll never have again.
But it’s okay. I’ll be okay.
Probably.
Then I flinch. Eli sits next to me.
Forearms on his knees, hands clamped together like it’s the only thing holding him here, keeping him from bolting.
He doesn’t look at me. But he tries to.
Then he asks, quietly, carefully, “You up for sharing?”
And I fall for him again. For the third or tenth or two hundredth time.
Momma may have sent this cake, but he could’ve left it at my door, could’ve asked Rey to deliver it. But he’s here. He sat here without me so much as hinting I wished he would.
This man who expects goodbyes, prepares for them. This man who fights so hard for his feelings, to unearth them from childhood trauma and assholes who make him think he’s too much, make him feel his only worth is in understanding horses and fixing what’s broken and then letting go.
It’s not. It’s the least amazing thing about him.
This man… He’s still trying.
I sniff. Then smirk. “No. Get your own cake.”
He actually pouts, damn him. Which obviously makes me blurt out a chuckle so ugly I’d be mortified if I wasn’t dying inside.
And if this wasn’t him, beside me.
“Fine, here.” I give him first serve. “Don’t hog it.”
We eat in silence, the sweetness of the cake melting on my tongue. I sigh. He does too. It’s soothing, almost perfect.
If this was all there is and the rest of the world didn’t exist. If there was nothing to figure out, no countdown, no deadline.
And no cellphone in my back pocket suddenly chiming.
Mom’s ringtone.