Gus
“You wanna go for a hike, girl?” I stood and stretched.
Clementine jumped off the couch and stretched as well.
“Okay. Lemme make the coffee, then we can get going.”
Once the pot was brewing, I grabbed my phone and shot Sam a text. Then I sent one to Jude. They were both usually willing to meet me. The last twenty-four hours had thrown me, and I needed to clear my head.
Sam met me by the trail, a massive tumbler of coffee in his hand. He kept his hair short and had a thick beard peppered with gray.
“You and your early morning texts.” He shook his head, but he was grinning. “When you’re old like me—”
“Forty-seven is not old.”
“Sometimes I feel eighty-seven.”
We’d been through just about all of life’s ups and downs together. He was the steady, helpful guy who was always willing to listen. Particularly back when I was young and stupid.
He had the things I’d wanted. The loving wife, the kids, and the house in town where he worked on projects on the weekends. One summer, I’d spent all kinds of time over there, helping him build a treehouse.
“How’s Em?”
He smiled. He was always bursting with pride. “Excellent. Dean’s list again this semester. Doing research for one of her professors and volunteering at the animal shelter for the summer.”
“Sophomore?”
A single nod. “Going into her junior year. Already talking about graduate school.” He scratched his neck. “Gotta figure out how to pay for it, but I’ll make it happen.”
“And Luc?”
He rolled his eyes. “Still figuring it out. But he’s working hard. I wish he’d go back to school. Hoping he will when he’s ready. Staying with his mom in Florida.”
I nodded. “You ever think about dating?” It had been almost five years since his wife left. She was his first love, and I supposed I was wondering if he’d ever really felt like he could move on.
He laughed. “Sure. Once in a while. But I don’t have much to offer a woman. I finally got the job I spent years gunning for, so for now, I’m good with just enjoying the challenge. And with my baby girl home from college for the summer, I want to spend every minute I can with her.”
“Maybe someday,” I said.
“I’ve tried in the past, but it’s never felt right.
I’m a marriage guy. I like commitment, and I’m a sucker for the little joys in life.
Snuggling on the porch on a summer night, picking up her favorite ice cream on the way home from work.
Dating is like having one creepy job interview after another. And don’t get me started on apps.”
Agreed. Dating was a shit show, especially in rural Maine, where most of us had known one another since childhood. I’d done okay, mainly because I was willing to travel to meet women, but I understood his perspective.
“I’ve got all kinds of shit to do today,” he said, “so how about you tell me what you want to talk about?”
With a deep breath in, then back out, I considered how best to explain myself. Finally, I just put it out there in simple terms. “I want Chloe back. We were married a long time ago. It was a mess, and I didn’t fight for her. Because of that, I lost her.”
He ducked his head, surveying the path as we continued. “I suspected something was going on.”
Although he was my closest confidant, Sam didn’t know everything.
“For years, I thought I’d done the right thing by letting her go, that we would have never worked. But now, every time I see her, it guts me that we could have been together all this time, that I fucked everything up.”
He ground to a halt and crossed his arms. “Stop right there. I get the urge to look backward too. But it won’t help you now. And I think you’re jumping to some big conclusions about what happened in the past.”
He kept walking. “Ashley and I married at twenty-one. We had Luc at twenty-two. And we did our best, day in and day out, for a long time. Maybe we didn’t last because we took on so much so young.
I couldn’t tell you. Now that I’m older, I have so many regrets.
Back then, we didn’t know better. We got locked into this life really early.
And while I loved it, and my children are the greatest thing to happen to me, she struggled up here.
And, ultimately, we didn’t fit anymore.”
“So you can do this one of two ways,” he said, heading back down the path.
“You can choose to believe that life would have been amazing and mourn the loss of the last twenty years, or you can get your head on straight, realize that you had a lot of growing to do, and get yourself together. Take a real shot at this. Don’t wallow in what-ifs. ”
Shit, he was right.
I roughed a hand down my face. “She hates me.”
“I don’t know what happened between you, but from what I’ve seen of her so far, she’s smart and fair. You’ve been stuck in a rut for a long time. Maybe it’s time to make a change.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean that maybe you’re the problem. You’re marching around the woods, dwelling on shit that happened decades ago instead of focusing on what you can control.”
The look he gave me made it clear the conversation was over. It was time for me to shut up and let his words marinate in my brain. I had spent a lot of my life looking backward. Especially since my dad’s involvement in drug trafficking had come to light. But maybe it was time to look forward.
After five miles of hiking and a shower, I was feeling better.
I should have been sore and exhausted from our all-night sex-a-thon. I should have been frustrated by her coldness and the way she brushed me off.
Instead, I was feeling downright hopeful.
Because though she hid behind thick, protective armor, I’d seen the ache in those deep brown eyes when I shut the car door, and I’d seen all her internal conflicts play out on her face.
She was feeling things. Complicated things.
I had to let her walk away and process. But among all the swirling emotions was hope, along with a connection deeper than anything I’d ever felt before.
I stood on my back porch, coffee in hand, and surveyed the trees and the mountains surrounding me, letting the fresh air fill my lungs. This was my chance. But I had no idea how to seize it.
I’d been set in my ways for decades. Making the same unfulfilling choices over and over. Dreaming the same dreams until they no longer even mattered. Living my life on autopilot.
But what if there was another option? What if I could wake up tomorrow and do it all differently?
Because Sam was right. I was the problem here.
I was forty years old and arguably at a low point.
My father was in prison.
The family business I’d devoted my entire life to had just been sold.
And my family was fractured and split.
Twenty-four hours ago, I’d felt nothing but anger, but now my mission was becoming clear.
Last night, my heart had remembered how it felt to hold her. Her laugh had calmed me, and the warmth of her smile had lit me up inside.
We were older, sure, and she’d just purchased my family’s company, but what did that matter? I had been planning a cross-country move for months, but suddenly, all I could think about was feeling the way I felt when she was in my arms. I needed that again.
The muscle memory of being with her was still so strong.
In her proximity, I was happier than I ever remembered being. I felt like myself. When I was with her, I was the complete version of Gus Hebert. The way I was supposed to be.
Not the closed-off grump. Not the oldest child, the caretaker, or the workaholic who’d sacrificed everything for his family’s business.
Just Gus.
The Gus who hated fancy coffee drinks but drank them without complaint because she’d made them.
The Gus who’d checked out a book about constellations from the library so he could impress her with his knowledge of the night sky.
The Gus who woke up every morning knowing he’d found his purpose.
I didn’t need distance from Lovewell to get unstuck. I had to do that myself. Change was hard, but it was time. For so long, I’d assumed I only had one setting—the closed-off, grumpy workaholic who always put the company first.
I leaned back. I’d been telling myself lies. Evolution was possible, if only I could get over my own shit.
The thought of talking to her, getting to know who she’d become, just being in her orbit, was enough to shake loose all the hurt and anger and pain I’d been collecting over the years.
I wasn’t a genius like Owen or an athlete like Cole. Hell, I wasn’t confident like Finn.
But I worked hard. I put in the effort. And this would be no different.
I could let our confrontation this morning pull me farther down. I could sink into the sadness and hurt and shame of losing the business and our ill-advised hookup.
Or I could choose to live for myself and go after what I wanted.
But first, I had a lot to do, starting with a TED Talk.
I needed a plan.
Gus Hebert dealt in certainties. He had total conviction in all things. He managed his days deliberately and productively.
But spending the night with her had thrown my mind into disarray. Suddenly, so many concerns and ideals I’d held on to were no longer important. Like one kiss had demolished the invisible walls that had been holding me hostage for years.
Whether my strategy was a good one was debatable, but planning was what I did best. Chloe LeBlanc wasn’t the kind of woman to be won over by some half-assed attempts, so I was in it to win it.
It would take time to get through to the strong-willed, stubborn, headstrong woman who’d always had my heart.
But I was a patient man. I’d play the long game.
Get all my chess pieces arranged on the board.
“Why are you pacing outside my place of business?” Becca quipped from the doorway of her salon, one hand on her hip, the other wrapped around a coffee mug.
I gave her a sheepish smile. I hadn’t been social these last few months.
“It’s been a while.” Lips quirked on one side, she waved her hand at me. “You’ve gone full Unabomber.”
Ouch. “That’s why you’re my first stop today.”
She arched a brow. “I don’t open for another thirty minutes.”