Chapter 23
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
HAILEY
“ W hat?” A mousy voice I hardly recognize squeaks out of me.
Am I really asking for him to repeat what he said? I don’t think I need to hear it again for as long as I live.
“You don’t belong here,” he says again. I focus on his voice this time rather than the words coming out of his mouth. It sounds so withdrawn. As if I’m a statue he’s having a one-sided conversation with, not his own living breathing daughter.
I pinch the bridge of my nose, clutch the sleeve of my shirt, fight the moisture in my eyes. None of it is making me feel any better. Neither is the empty pink bottle helicoptering at my feet. I bend over, pick it up, and pitch it in the tin trash can a foot from me.
Pain splinters in the center of my chest and spiders throughout my bloodstream until everything feels unbearable. My skin, the air, his presence, it’s all too much. I can’t stay here trapped in this silent prison.
For once, I disappear first.
I sprint in the opposite direction of camp, my lungs fighting for clean air. A wooden bench stakes the end of a gravel road, and I collapse onto the seat. Something sharp digs into my back. What on earth …
A bent metal plaque drilled to the slats reads There my heart lies, scattered among the pines .
I huff. “Fitting.”
Three scoots and I no longer have to feel it pressing into my shoulder blade. I fixate on its meaning instead.
What do I do now? How do I stay here?
I turn these questions over and over, wondering if they’ll always be hypothetical or if an answer will ever come to me, when a shadow shades my face.
“You okay?”
I gaze up toward the sky, and the sight of him is all it takes for the tears I’ve been holding back to cascade in droves down my cheeks.
He sits down next to me. The wooden planks groan with the weight of him. Is that stubble on his cheeks? It wasn’t there the last time I saw him. Then again, neither was the inch of ash blanketing his clothes.
I turn away to wipe my eyes on my sleeve.
“I’m fine,” I say.
Reed places a warm, solid hand on my knee. “You don’t have to pretend with me.”
“I’m not,” I lie. Because this is what I do now. I keep my iron clad walls up. Because if I don’t, I get too hopeful for things that never come to pass. Like the idea that Reed could be my shelter from the storms of life.
“Yes. You are. You want to know how I know that?”
I finally turn and look at him. “How?”
“Because we’re more alike than I care to admit.”
He runs his hand along my cheek, brushing away the strand of hair that’s slipped from my braid and tucking it behind my ear .
“Well.” He chuckles. “In one way, anyway. You’d never forget to break in your boots or skip water when your body is screaming for it.”
I hiccup.
“You’d also know that ants live through fire, and it would be worth your time to set up a tent so they don’t ravage your sleeping bag in the middle of the night,” he continues.
I laugh out loud. “Did that actually happen to you?”
His eyes glance sideways before he smirks at me. “No.”
Liar.
“And you sure as hell would know what poison oak looks like before kneeling on top of it.”
I cringe. “You got it too?”
He winces. “You’ll always be way more prepared than me. But that’s not the point.”
“Then what is?” I ask him.
“You’re afraid to let people in.”
He says it like he knows the feeling intimately. I don’t deny it either. I can’t. I’ve been disappointed, let down, looked over, and forgotten enough times in my life not to hide behind the structure I’ve built around my heart.
“But he doesn’t deserve to be let in,” I argue.
“Maybe not yet.”
He holds out a folded picture to me no more than four inches all the way around. The edges are tattered but the faces are clear. I suck in a breath.
“Where did you get this?”
“It fell out of your dad’s pocket on the line,” he says.
It’s the one that used to rest on the nightstand in my bedroom.
“You want to tell me about it?” he asks.
I shake my head. I wouldn’t know what to tell him. I’ve had a million questions go unanswered about it myself .
What hospital was I born at?
How long did she hold me like that?
Did she love me?
Questions I’ve been too afraid to ask after he shut me down the first time.
The rustle of a nearby tree sweeps me back to that night: the last time I saw this picture.
“Daddy, will you tell me a story?”
“Okay. One story, then it’s time for you to get to bed.”
He tucked me under the weight of a heavy quilt, and I looked out the window to see the branches of a pine tree swaying.
Wind. It reminded me that he was leaving soon.
“Once upon a time…” he started.
“No, Daddy. A real story.” My small hands reached over to the nightstand and hugged the gold frame. “The one about me and Mommy.”
He peeled my fingers off the frame and set it gently back where it came from. “It’s getting late, Hailey. We should get you to sleep.”
“But you promised ,” I whined.
He shook his head. “There is no story. She’s gone.”
A flash of grief passed over his face that night, and I hated seeing him like that.
Whenever he started to look that way, he’d always leave for work early. So, I told him it was okay. I dropped it, even though it wasn’t. At least not to me. But I didn’t want him to leave me yet, so I learned to ask for a different story.
I kept things surface level after that. It was my fault he didn’t want to stick around. I pushed him away.
But Reed’s never once made me feel afraid to ask hard questions or tell him what I’m thinking. He feels safe to open up to.
“It’s a picture of me and my mother,” I say. “The only one that was ever taken. ”
Even now, I study her in her hospital gown, looking exhausted but enamored with the newborn version of me wrapped in a tight bundle in her arms.
A tear slips from the corner of my eye and I shake my head. “He wouldn’t carry this around with him. He doesn’t care.”
Reed touches my hand. It’s a simple gesture, but one I feel to my core.
“I don’t think caring is the problem here, Red. I think the man cares a whole lot more than he lets on. There’s a reason he’s hiding this in the pocket of his clothes. He’s protecting himself.”
“From what?”
“Maybe himself? But what do I know.” He nudges me with his knee. “I’m just the rookie who doesn’t ask questions, remember? You’re the inquisitive one.”
“I can’t ask him that,” I say, holding out the picture.
I want him to take it. Give it back himself. Throw it away for all I care, because I can’t look at it anymore.
“You should keep it. Wait for the right time.” He closes my fingers over it, tucking it in the palm of my hand. Then he changes the subject. “What are you doing with your days off?”
Spending time with you , my heart wants to say.
I slip the picture in my pocket and stand. He stands too.
“I… don’t know. I guess I’ll head back to town. Get away for a couple of days.” A trip that involves saying goodbye to him and riding in an ambulance with Ben.
I decelerate my pace.
He slides in front of me, sweeping his palms beneath my thighs and wrapping my legs around his waist.
“Change of plans,” he whispers with that dimpled smile I’ve come to love.
It’s hard to stay sad with him looking at me like that. I palm the crown of his fire helmet and fit it over my head.
“It looks better on you,” he says, dropping his gaze to my lips.
Suddenly, all the air sweeps from my lungs. “Does it?” I ask, pressing my fingertips to his jaw.
When we’re nothing but a breath apart, our smiles finally touch.
“You’re mine tonight, Red.”