Chapter 35
messages in a bottle
Rowan
Hannah
Can you get your hands on a tux by next Friday?
Me
Do I get to know WHY you’re asking me to secure such a torture device?
Hannah
Okay, dramatic
You. Me. 8th annual BCH fundraiser gala. You in?
The night before I leave. Absolutely zero part of me plans to say no to her invitation.
Hannah in a formal gown, orchestrating an event I know means so much to her for an organization she’s excited to start the next phase of her career at—I’ll be there with bells on.
And a tuxedo. And a fist around my heart knowing I’ll have to say goodbye in the morning.
Me
Depends. You gonna be in a fancy dress?
Hannah
So fancy. It has pockets.
Me
That’s wild, so will my tux.
Hannah
Atta boy, soldier.
I drop my phone to the kitchen counter as the furniture delivery guys hand over the paperwork for me to sign. There’s never been much I wanted to change about this place, but I couldn’t keep the bed or mattress where Pops died. Just couldn’t.
Three grand and a hefty service fee later, it’s out with the old and in with the new.
And thanks to my inheritance, I barely feel it.
I’ll barely feel much of anything for the foreseeable future when it comes to expenses.
The money from Nana’s life insurance payout five years ago still sits pretty in the bank.
Add Pops’ to that, along with the sale of the house in town, and I’m all set. For a while at least.
The box truck peels down the gravel drive, kicking up a cloud of dust behind it.
Tucked off to the right is Pops’ garage filled to the brim with boxes, trunks, and whatever else he’d been tinkering with for the past forty years.
I’ve yet to touch anything inside save for the stack of bins I added from my clean out of the Boulder house.
I have eleven days to go scour through everything before I leave the property vacant for god knows how long. It’s more than enough time, honestly. But it’s not enough time with Hannah.
Eleven nights is all we have left.
Eleven nights to cook dinner for her, to let her slaughter me in chess. Eleven nights to sip hot chocolate under the stars. Eleven nights to share a bed, to kiss her until she falls asleep in my arms. Eleven mornings to wake up next to her and make her subpar over-medium eggs.
A smarter man would tread lightly. He’d set boundaries to protect her heart and his. Yet, her suitcase is in the bedroom. When she leaves the office this afternoon, she’ll drive here instead of to her own house.
The time for being smart has long since passed.
Nana’s cast iron skillet sits on the stovetop, and I collect the butter from the fridge.
The aroma of rosemary and olive oil fills the cabin from the tray of potatoes roasting in the oven.
Fresh ribeyes I picked up on my grocery haul in town this morning are seasoned and ready to go in the pan as soon as Hannah gets here.
She’s still about fifteen minutes out, so I crack open a beer while I wait.
My phone dings with an incoming FaceTime from Mom. Taking a swig, I lean the camera against the fruit bowl and sit down at the table to accept the call.
“Hey, Mom.”
“Ro, honey,” she says, smile wide as she sits propped against her headboard. “I miss my boy’s beautiful face.”
“Miss you too.”
“How goes it out there?” Before I can answer, her eyes narrow through the screen. “Is that the lake house?”
I pick up the phone and give her a quick sweep of the space.
“My gosh, it hasn’t changed a bit.” There’s a wistfulness to her tone. Maybe a little sorrow too.
Those first few years after Dad died, Mom and I would visit together.
Her on the twin bed in the loft, me on an air mattress beside it.
Naturally, things began to shift when she met Doug.
New marriage, another kid added to the blended mix, it didn’t make sense for us all to come out here.
So I started making the trip alone every summer.
Nana and Pops never begrudged her for it and neither did I.
Her life was moving forward and that’s all they ever wanted for her.
But I’m sure the memories this place carries may make it a bittersweet sight.
“Is that awful shower curtain still there?” she asks.
“Mauve as the day is long,” I answer, positioning the phone back on the table. The absence of Dubs’ cocky energy and Bri’s snarky comebacks have my curiosity piqued. “Where is everybody?”
“Oh, you know, I’m sure there’s weeping and gnashing of teeth happening somewhere in the general vicinity.”
“Dubs driving you crazy?”
“God, no! That boy is my precious. Protect him at all costs.”
“Please, never let him hear you say that. His head’s big enough as it is.” We laugh and I take another sip. “Everything else okay? Therapy good?”
She waves a dismissive hand. “Of course, of course, that’s all fine. We’re meeting with the doctor next week to talk about the surgery, blah blah blah. Can a mom just call to catch up with her son?”
“Alright,” I snicker. “Let’s talk, Mom.”
The phone nearly topples off her lap as she shifts her weight.
Her mouth pinches into a wince when she settles again.
I bite the inside of my cheek to keep my inside thoughts from becoming outside thoughts.
No matter how much Bri and I encourage her to take something stronger for the pain, she refuses.
After a few tense seconds, she finds a comfortable position and her features soften again, eyes gleaming. “Tell me about the girl.”
Add to the list of not-smart things I do that involve Hannah James: introducing her to my family via video chat three days ago when I’ve never done anything of the sort in my previous thirty-one years of life. There’s not a chance in hell I can sidestep this conversation.
I lean back in my chair on a sigh. “Okay, I’m ready. Do your worst.”
It’s no surprise she wants the full story.
So, claiming maternal duress, I give it to her.
Though I leave out the parking lot assault—not my story to tell.
But everything else about how we met five years ago, how I almost bashed her head in with a door last week, and about how she’s been here for Pops without my knowledge the whole time—I lay it all out.
It takes several minutes, but I finally finish the tale of the runaway bride and her soldier. And because Mom is Mom, she reads between the lines. All the lines. Every godforsaken last one.
“Hannah sounds special.”
A flat lift of my eyes to hers behind a conveniently timed swig of beer is answer enough, but I don’t need Mom to feel guilty over something outside of her control.
“She knows I’m leaving soon.” She’s about to push back, to apologize for being the reason I can’t stay. I cut her off with a deflection before she gets the chance. “Hey, FYI, I think I’m gonna do a memorial service for Pops after all.”
Mercifully, she lets the shift in topics slide. “I’m happy to hear that, sweetheart.”
Headlights cut through the trees beyond the kitchen window. “She’s home, Mom. I gotta go.”
Home. A slip of the tongue. A phrase that’s more muscle memory than anything else. Except, my heart lurches in my chest when I say it.
Mom does her mom-thing again, cutting me with her all-knowing voodoo eyes.
I cough into my fist to move past it. “Don’t tell Dubs all that stuff about Hannah.
He knows the bare minimum and I’d like to keep it that way for now.
” Lord, I’d never hear the end of it if my best friend knew the whole story.
By the time Mom and I say goodbye, Hannah’s walking through the front door looking like she’s done it a million times. She hangs her purse on the coat rack, sets her heels against the wall.
“Hungry?” I ask.
She meets me at the stove with a smirk, swiping my beer to steal the last sip. “He cooks too?”
“Among other things.” I wink.
Hannah pinches my waist as she passes behind me to pull two more bottles from the fridge. “Another beer?”
I crank up the flame under the skillet. “Sure, bottle opener’s in the—”
“Got it,” she says over the screech of a drawer. I turn toward the sound.
Bottle caps clink on the counter and she tosses the opener back in, slamming it shut with her hip.
Wordlessly, she hands me my bottle, only glancing at me for a beat before she tips hers back with one hand and collects two plates from the cabinet above the toaster with the other. Then gliding seamlessly to another drawer for forks and knives.
She moves through the space like she owns it. Tiny glimpses of her time here with Pops like hidden messages in a bottle washing up on shore.
My mouth goes dry. I take a long pull of my IPA against the realization beating my ribs senseless.
Hannah already lives here.
Our pretend playhouse becomes a love bubble.
Evenings spent over the chess board, on the dock with hot chocolate, and sprawled on the couch in our pajamas.
We lie in bed at night exchanging stories.
She tells me about her day, we make plans for Pops’ memorial.
She asks about my scars and tattoos. I kiss her.
I kiss her a lot. Only chastely, lingering just long enough for the weight in my lungs to ease and that low sleepy hum to rattle the back of her throat.
I touch her when she asks me to. Practice touches is what we coin them.
I stay within the boundaries she sets, my hands coasting over her skin until she drifts off.
The first night, the second night, and the third.
It’s the kind of bliss you spend most of your life thinking only exists in fairytales. Until you find it for yourself only to discover you can’t keep it.
Then the bliss becomes torture.
And I wouldn’t give up a single second of it.