Chapter 14
CHAPTER 14
GAbrIEL
Avery’s in my arms. According to the clock on the dresser, it’s nine-thirty in the morning. I never sleep in. Never. I also rarely sleep through the night, and guess what? Last night, I did.
Her head is heavy on my chest, her hair cascading off the side. I remember what this was like, to wake up next to her on days when I wasn’t waking up on an uncomfortable excuse for a bed at the fire station.
It’s not hard to remember, because I never forgot. Avery was always only as far away as my open eyes. Close them, and there she was.
But this? A million times better.
She makes a soft noise, a tired moan, and shifts. Her cheek drags over half my chest, and she turns, eyes on my face.
The corners of my lips turn up at the sight of sleepy Avery, but the look in her eyes stops me. It’s fleeting, this look, and she’s already replaced it with happiness, but still. I saw it.
She slides up a few inches and places a delicate peck on the corner of my mouth. “This is a dream, right? Waking up with you?”
I can tell she means it. She’s thrilled it’s my face she saw when she opened her eyes. But first, she was surprised. She woke up next to Hudson for months. I’m assuming, anyway.
This is the first time I’ve fleshed out this idea of Avery in a different relationship, and what that entails. In my imagination, they did what we did.
She woke up next to him. She knows his favorite food, has likely had dinner with his parents. They’ve probably been on vacation together.
Avery’s two fingers brush over the skin between my eyebrows, smoothing apart the furrowed skin. “You look upset.” She props herself up and looks down, the ends of her hair tickling my chest.
“It’s nothing.” I don't know what we’re doing, or how long this will last, and I don’t want it marred by unpleasant feelings.
A stern look comes over her face. “Don’t do that.”
“Don’t do what?”
“Don’t hold back because you think I won’t like what you have to say. Because you think what you say might cause me to feel a certain way.”
She’s good. She’s even better than she was when she was practicing. Maybe it was all that therapy she went through for herself.
I toy with the end of a strand of her hair, and say, “You were surprised to see me when you woke up. I could tell.”
Her lips purse. “Yeah,” she admits, her voice soft. “Sorry about that.”
“Nothing to be sorry for.”
She shrugs. “True or not, I still feel bad.” Her fingertips trace over my chest. “It’s ok for me to feel bad. You didn’t cause that.”
I open my mouth, but she shakes her head. “Please don’t say anything more. That feeling is mine. I own it. And you can’t take it away, or make it better.” She taps her finger on a large freckle on my chest. “For the record, I was surprised for a nanosecond. I feel very happy to wake up and see you.”
I reach for her face, molding my palm to her cheek. I have the strongest urge to ask her what the hell we’re doing, what this all means. Do I dare read into the past twenty-four hours? I’m not willing to risk an answer I won’t like, and the question tumbles back down into my throat. “Do you want to come to the shop for a few hours today? I need to finish up a barn door.”
“I would love to.” She smiles when she says it. “Mind if I bring my laptop? I need to work for a little while, too.”
“I don’t mind.” I look at the clock again. “I should run home. Shower, do a few things around my place. Can I pick you up at noon?” My lower lip draws in between my teeth, and I chew. Avery eyes the motion knowingly, and lightly tugs at my lip until I release it.
“Nervous?” she asks.
“A little,” I admit. This is reminding me of our first date, the way I asked her out in the parking lot at the fire station. I’m as nervous now as I was that day.
“Noon is perfect.” She presses a light kiss to my mouth, then starts to pull away. I catch her hand, pulling her back, and she doesn’t protest. I think she was waiting, hoping I wasn’t done with her.
I’m not. Not by a long shot.
Gently I guide her onto her back and make love to her.
There isn’t a chance I’ll be wasting any opportunities with this woman.
I’ve cleared off a work table for Avery.
She sits, click-clacking away on her keyboard, while I work on the custom barn door order we got last week. I catch her looking at me. She’s adorable in the safety goggles and ear protection I made her wear. We share a smile, then go back to what we were doing. We repeat this process in ten-minute increments, as if we are teenagers.
Eventually Avery tires of this and gets off her stool. She points to her head, asking if she can take off the safety gear. I nod my yes, and she sets them beside her computer, then walks closer. I set down the jointer I’d been using, and she looks over the pieces of the door I cut earlier.
“Did Joel teach you how to do this?” She sounds impressed.
“Yeah. He’s taught me a lot. Some stuff I learned on my own. The internet can teach a person just about everything.”
“I have a love/hate relationship with the internet.”
I chuckle. “Why is that?”
“It can be intrusive. Grant access to people who you’d otherwise not have access to. And them, to you.”
This opinion had to be formed from experience. It’s too specific.
“What happened?” I ask.
She looks down, gently knocking the tip of her tennis shoe against my steel-toed boot. “I received letters after you went to prison. They were well-meaning, but they were from random people. Mostly women, telling me they were sorry for how everything worked out. Some men”—she pauses, shudders—“offering their services, should I require them.”
“What the fuck,” I mutter, my face scrunching in a mixture of anger and disbelief. The audacity of people.
“It was those stupid articles from?—”
“Domenica.”
We’re quiet for a minute.
“I’m sorry I rained on our parade. I didn’t mean to bring all that up.” Avery grabs the box with my burn tools and machine from the next table, holding it out. “What is all this?” There’s a desperate edge to her voice, a need to change the subject.
“Woodburner.” I point to the machine. “And these are the tips. Each one produces a different effect.”
“Did Joel teach you this, too?”
“I learned wood burning in high school.”
“Were you good back then?” Her inquiry is soft, almost hesitant. “Did you love it?”
“Yes. And yes.”
She reaches into the box. Her hand stills and she sends me a questioning glance.
“It’s ok,” I say, gesturing to the contents of the box.
She pulls out a tip, turning it over and examining.
“Spear shader,” I say.
Her eyes meet mine, then go back to the implement. “Did you start with woodworking and…” She searches for the right word for wood burning.
“Pyrography,” I supply.
“Pyrography,” she repeats. “Did you move on to pyrography when you knew you liked working with wood?”
“The teacher saw I was talented. He suggested something that required more artistic skills. I think he was grateful there was a student who didn’t see his class as a waste of time.”
“And you were naturally good at it, weren’t you?” One side of her mouth turns up in a smile. “It wouldn’t surprise me. You’ve always been that way. Naturally capable.”
My limbs heat under her praise. “I’d like to say yes, but no. My first attempts were garbage.”
She laughs once. “I bet that’s not true.”
I give her a knowing look. “It’s one hundred percent true. But I got better. I kept practicing. My teacher let me come into the classroom after school and work. I didn’t think about it until now, but I’m sure that meant he stayed late.” My heart pinches at the realization.
“Did your parents know you were good at it?”
I nod once. “They thought it was a little hobby. They called it whittling.”
Avery snorts derisively. “Sounds about right. When did you stop?”
“After Nash died. I put all my focus into becoming a firefighter.”
“And then you put all your focus into allowing me to step into my career.” She stares down at the box.
I coax her gaze up with a finger under her chin. “Don’t feel bad. Choices, remember? I made mine.”
She nods, but she still feels guilty, and I don’t know how to change that.
I let go of her chin, removing my chisel and writing tips from the box. “The next order is a sign for a wall. I think it’s a wedding gift. Want to watch?”
Avery grabs the stool she’d been sitting on and places it beside me at my bench. She sits down and grips the edge of the stool with both hands, leaning forward. Her hair falls over her shoulders, hanging in the air.
I point at the hair tie on her wrist. “May I?”
She looks at me, not understanding what I mean.
“It’s not safe to have your hair hanging near tools.” I work the hair tie over her hand. Stepping behind her, I gather her hair. My fingers brush the nape of her neck.
A pleased sigh filters out from her. Her head tips left, and my fingers slide around her neck, moving gently back and forth. Avery’s closed-mouth groan curls into me, making me think about things we can’t do here.
“You’d better stop,” she murmurs.
“Or?” My hand dips lower, skimming the tops of her breasts.
The back of her head meets my chest. “I don’t know. I don’t have anything good to say next.”
I smile at the top of her head and take back my hand. “We can’t do anything in here anyway.” I finish the job of tying back her hair and take my seat.
“Out of respect for Joel, you mean?”
I lay out the rectangular slice of walnut. “Mostly, yes. Joel has been good to me.”
“What about your parents?”
“What about them?”
“How have they been to you?”
I flip on my woodburner, adjusting the dials to my preference. “Supportive, I suppose. As much as they can be.” I start in the right-hand corner, pressing the chisel into the wood. “They try. They just…”
“Fall short?”
“I’ve disappointed them. And I’ll never measure up.” I continue the length of the wood, turning it forty-five degrees when I get to the lower corner. “I don’t see that changing.”
It used to hurt like hell to think about my parents, and all the ways I’ve let them down. Now I feel bad for them, more than anything else. They’re choosing to miss out on their only child, because they can’t get over what happened to Nash. Maybe they have the kind of broken heart that will never heal. Maybe they fear healing, because they think it means leaving Nash behind. I don’t know what it’s like to be them, to be parents who’ve lost a son. I do know what it feels like to lose a brother, to have half of your heart ripped out and wonder how the world keeps turning when he’s not in it.
I pause my work. Avery’s frowning. She always felt defensive of me, always hated the way my parents had an obvious preference for Nash. I liked the way she disapproved of their attitude, the way she’d go to bat for me. If this feeling in my chest is any indication, I still do.
“Do you ever think about telling them how you feel?” Avery shrugs one shoulder. “If I can tell my dad, maybe…”
“I think about it. I can’t imagine actually doing it, though. My mom… I don’t know if she can handle it. It would hurt her to hear how I feel.” It would require me to say Nash’s name, something we all go to great lengths not to do around her.
Avery smiles in this tiny, sad way. “I said the same thing to my therapist. I didn’t want to hurt my dad by telling him how he hurt me.”
“But you did. Tell him, I mean.”
“I thought I was supposed to protect him. Like I was being selfless.” She shakes her head. “It’s the other way around. He was supposed to be selfless and protect me, but his grief crippled him in the parenting department. Our relationship is better now that I was honest about how I felt.”
“My mom…” My sentence trails off. I don’t know how to say what I want to say.
“You fear what will happen if you say something. I get that. But look at what happened when you didn’t speak up.” Avery rubs a hand over my shoulder. “People are more resilient than we think. Especially when it’s asked of them.”
I survived two years in prison, a place where resilience is key. Perhaps I’ve been selling my parents short. They too, can hear they messed up, and remain standing.
And if my parents can be resilient, and Avery’s dad, and Avery, and me… What about our relationship? Can we resurrect it?
“Avery,” I say, my tool poised above the wood. She lifts her gaze from where she’d been watching, waiting for me to resume. “Can I take you to dinner tonight?”
Her steady, clear-eyed gaze is on me. “Yes.”