Chapter 29
Jamie
That's Sam, isn't it? He's not a confrontational kind of guy.
Amber's voice had been replaying inside my head for four days.
I couldn't live with myself if I let him humiliate you the same way Bryce did.
I gripped the cup a little tighter.
He's playing you, Jamie. And I thought you ought to know so you can make an informed decision about whether you really want to be with Sam Reeves.
What was hard was that Amber hadn't lied. Or at least, I didn't know what was a lie and what wasn't. Which made it impossible to tell what was the truth.
Havensworth doesn't like outsiders telling them what's broken. And you've been gone a long time.
He discouraged me.
You need to give him a minute to figure out what kind of man he wants to be.
If you won't believe me, ask him.
Maybe that's why he couldn't tell you up front. Because he feels guilty.
Megan set a plate of toast down in front of me.
"Eat."
"I'm not hungry."
"Eat anyway. I did not make toast for you to stare at it."
I picked up a piece and didn't take a bite.
She sat down across from me with her coffee. She watched me for a second and then she pushed the plate an inch closer with two fingers—which was Megan for ‘eat the damn toast.’
"When did you last sleep?"
"I sleep."
"Jamie."
"Some."
She didn't push. She got up, refilled her mug, poured one for me too without asking, and sat back down.
"Rosie asked me this morning if Sam went to be with Mommy and Daddy too."
Her face changed.
"In the clouds."
"Oh, Jamie."
I set the toast down.
I'd told her everything on the phone while I was driving over. The parking lot. The letter. The key. Jack. Bryce. All of it. She'd been quiet a long time on the other end and then she'd said get your ass over here.
She reached across the table and put her hand over mine.
"I want to say something and I want you to not interrupt."
"Okay."
"That bitch."
I didn't answer.
"That bitch, Jamie."
She squeezed my hand, then let it go and sat back. Her hands went flat on the table, which was how she sat when she was deciding how much she was going to say.
"She opened a wound and she poked a bruise. She took Bryce, Jack, and she put them in a parking lot in front of you with your groceries in the trunk. She knew exactly what she was doing. Don't let me ever hear you say she didn't."
"Meg."
"No. I have been sitting in this house for an hour thinking about this and I am telling you. She picked the two things that would make you run. At the same time. On purpose."
"She wasn't lying about Jack."
"I know."
"If she wasn't lying about Jack, how do I know what else she wasn't lying about?"
"You don't know what else she was lying about.
But Jamie, I've known Sam Reeves since he was seven years old.
That man has loved you his whole life. I don't know about the letter, or the key.
I don't know the details of any of that.
But I know what I've been watching for years, and Amber Henderson does not get to hand you this corrupted image of him in a parking lot and have that be the one that counts. "
"She knew enough to cut."
"Yes. She knew where to cut. That's not the same thing as being right."
I didn't answer.
"And listen." Her voice softened. "Rosie has already lost her father.
Don't let Amber take Sam from her too. Just talk to him.
I think you've taken enough time already.
Hear him out. And if it turns out Amber was right, I know where he lives and I know how to use a bat.
You don't have to do any of the hard work, Jamie. "
Something in me almost laughed. It came out as a short wet breath.
Megan squeezed my hand one more time.
"Eat your toast."
Sam's building caught the afternoon sun the way it always did, white stucco turning gold along the side where the magnolias grew. I sat in the car with my hands on the wheel for a long minute and looked up at it.
I think you've taken enough time already. Hear him out.
Don't let Amber take Sam from her too.
Megan was right. I'd sat with it long enough. I'd been angry, scared, embarrassed and exhausted. But somewhere along the way, the edge of that anger had dulled into something softer, and I could listen now. I owed him that much.
I got out of the car. The heat hit me on the walk to the entrance. I took the stairs up because I didn't trust myself to stand still in the elevator.
I was halfway up when I realized I hadn't checked whether he was home. I hadn't texted or called. I didn't know what I'd been planning, exactly—showing up unannounced at his door in the middle of the afternoon like this was something we did. Like I hadn't asked him to leave four days ago.
I stopped on the landing and let myself breathe.
I was already here. I could at least knock.
I kept going.
I was a few steps from his door when I heard it.
Music.
Slow country-rock through the wall. A man's voice and a guitar that moved like something underwater.
I knew it before I could name what it was.
It was the record we'd listened to together on his couch the day he almost kissed me.
It was my father's music. It was Jack's music.
It was Sam's. He'd grown up in my kitchen listening to it.
My hand went to my chest without my permission.
He was home.
I stood outside his door longer than I meant to. I listened. I hadn't let myself miss him until right now. Four days of not missing him caught up to me all at once, and I had to close my eyes and breathe through it.
Then I knocked.
The music stopped.
A pause. A long one.
Footsteps.
The sound of the lock turning.
The door opened.
Sam looked like he hadn't slept in four days. His hair was a mess. His shirt was wrinkled. His eyes went red at the edges the second they landed on me.
"Jamie."
"Sam." My voice came out quieter than I meant it to. "Can I come in?"
Sam stepped aside. I walked past him into the apartment and he closed the door behind me.
He turned around.
I saw his face and something in my chest folded.
He hadn't slept. He hadn't been eating. He'd been sitting in this apartment with Jack's music on. His phone face-down on the counter and nothing to do with his hands. I could see all four days on him at once.
"Jamie."
"I've been doing a lot of thinking."
He waited.
"I have questions. And I want you to answer them. Okay?"
"Okay."
I took a breath.
"Were you planning to go to college with Amber?"
"No."
"Then where did the acceptance letter come from?"
He shook his head.
"Amber and her father filed the application. Without asking me. I'd already said no—more than once, over months. They did it anyway. That's one of the reasons I broke up with her. She doesn't hear the word no when it's inconvenient for her."
I nodded slowly.
"And the key?"
He scratched the back of his head. The gesture I'd seen a hundred times when he didn't know where to start.
"The key is where I really messed up."
He took a breath. He was already trying to hold himself together before the first sentence.
"I'd been trying to break up with her for months.
She kept finding reasons for me to stay.
" He took a breath. "I'd said no to her functions before.
Once I told her I couldn't come to one of her mother's things and she showed up at my apartment with a suit in her hand.
That's how she was. That's how she is. You didn't tell Amber no.
You just told her something she was going to work around. "
I waited.
"Her mother's party. She'd been pushing me to come for weeks. I knew if I said no straight out, she'd just show up. So I asked Jack to cover for me. I went to the party because I was going to end it that night. I wanted it to be over."
His voice was getting thinner.
"I was there. I was about to pull her aside. And then the hospital called."
He stopped.
"Jack had gone back in for that little girl. He was already in intensive care by the time I left the party. I never told Amber anything that night. I went straight to the hospital."
His eyes closed.
"And then Jack was gone. I wasn't thinking about Amber. When I finally broke up with her, the key wasn't on my mind at all."
He opened his eyes. They were wet.
"I know how it looks, Jamie. I know. But that's what happened."
I couldn't move.
"So why didn't you tell me about Jack?"
He looked at me.
He opened his mouth. Closed it. I watched him try.
"I'm sorry, Jamie. I really am."
"Sam."
"I just couldn't live with myself. I knew I had to tell you. I just—I didn't know how. Because I still—"
His voice broke mid-sentence, the way it did when it had been held together too long with nothing behind it.
"Because I still blame myself. For all of it."
And then he broke.
He put his hand over his face. I watched his shoulders do the thing I'd only ever seen them do once, at the funeral, when he thought nobody was looking.
I crossed the room.
I put my arms around him.
He didn't resist it. He also didn't let himself lean in for a second, like he wasn't sure he was allowed. Then he did. His forehead came down to my shoulder and he broke the rest of the way.
"I'm sorry."
"I know."
"I'm so sorry, Jamie."
"I know, Sam."
He held onto the back of my shirt in both hands. I could feel him trying to breathe through it. I put my hand on the back of his head and held him there.
It took a while before he could talk again.
When he finally lifted his face, his eyes were red and wet. He couldn't meet mine.
"Sam, look at me."
He did.
"I don't blame you for Jack."
His face moved.
"I don’t."
"Jamie—"
"Listen to me. Jack went back in because he heard a little girl. He saved her. He died choosing to do what any of us would have prayed our brother would do." My voice stayed steady. I didn't know how. "You asked him to cover. He covered. After that, the rest of it was Jack."
His eyes closed. A tear slid down his face that he didn't bother to wipe.
"That's not on you, Sam. That was never on you."