Chapter 35
I ignored calls and texts from Gabe, Trish, Joy, and Beck, but I couldn’t ignore the call from Pastor Porter.
“The board voted, and we would be pleased to have you bring your outreach program to our church. I have your proposed schedule.
We’ll be ready to get started next Saturday,” he said, not letting me get a word in.
I didn’t know what I was going to do. Could I still do the program? Was I going to continue to work at the center? What I
learned had changed so many things. I didn’t want to dash his hopes. There was enough of that going around in my own life.
I said, “That’s great news. I’ll see you next week.”
Once we ended the call, I needed to write.
Not because a deadline demanded it, but because the story was the only place I had control.
It was the only place where things still made sense.
My characters were the only people I wanted to talk to.
I also couldn’t forget Red Car’s table, full of those books.
Her insistence that my books saved her life.
So instead of refreshing my inbox, waiting for a reply from my publisher, I stayed at my keyboard and kept going.
I didn’t want to think about what I’d learned, especially the part about Gabe.
It was all so shameful, and the harm to his family was unforgivable. I wasn’t sure how I was supposed to share my life with
him when my father had taken land from his family that would be worth millions now.
He and Ms. Kate, if she knew, were forgiving people, but the rest of the family would surely hate me. That reality crawled
up my back and strangled me from behind. I only escaped it in my fictionalized world, so I wrote for fifteen hours a day,
three days straight, barely eating, barely sleeping, pouring everything I couldn’t say to him onto the page. When my hands
finally stopped moving, it wasn’t because I was finished, but because I was starving. A pizza would serve me well. It would
last for several meals, and I could keep writing.
I gripped the steering wheel, blinking against tears I didn’t have time to feel. The pizza place was still fifteen minutes
away. Grief made every mile feel doubled. The drive back was slower and more miserable. Traffic had snarled on the highway,
headlights blinking through heavy rain. The world outside blurred into gray. It matched my insides.
Relief flooded my body when I finally made it back to the cabin. The words were bubbling up inside me. I loved when I couldn’t
stop a story from telling itself, but my excitement evaporated when I spotted Gabe’s car in the driveway. He was standing
on the porch.
Not now!
A heavy groan escaped my throat. He was the last person I wanted to see. I stepped out of the car. Attempting not to get wet,
I made a dash for the steps.
My footwear failed me as I came to understand the real meaning of flip-flop. I fell forward, and so did my pizza. Gabe was at my side in seconds, taking my arm and helping me up.
My knee. I’d scraped it, and it was burning hot.
“Are you okay?”
“No,” I replied. I pointed at the box. It was decent enough to land without spilling the contents, but rain was beating on
my pepperoni and sausage.
He stretched his body, picking up the box while holding on to my hand.
“Can you walk?”
Pulling my hand from his, I took a shaky step. Of course I could walk. The only thing that was hurt was my pride.
I limped to the door with him following, no doubt looking at my grass- and dirt-stained behind in the ridiculous shorts I
was wearing.
He followed me inside, put the pizza box on the table, and flipped open the lid. “It’s still edible.” He twisted his neck,
examining my leg. “Your knee is bleeding.”
It hurt like the devil. I leaned over to look and noted an angry scrape.
“Great.”
“I’ll get the first aid kit.”
He disappeared into the bathroom before I could fully protest. I dropped my bag on the coffee table, and just as I was about
to sit, I remembered my butt was dirty. I’d rolled over on it to get off my knee.
Limping to one of the dining room chairs, I dropped onto the hardwood with no fear of staining upholstery. I reached for a
slice of wet pizza and took a bite.
Gabe returned, wearing less than he was when he left. “My shirt was sticking to me. I hope you don’t mind. I stuck it in the
dryer.”
I dropped the slice back in the box and wiped my mouth with the back of my hand. I wasn’t sure if it was covered with grease or drool.
Gabe put the kit down on the table next to me. Biceps, abs, and pecs were a welcome distraction from the knee pain. He sorted
through the kit until he found what he was looking for. He held them up.
“Antibiotic cream and a bandage.”
I reached for them, and he leveled me with a gaze that said he’d fight me over this. Before I could protest further, he dropped
to a squat and picked up a wet paper towel that he must have had in his hand when he came out of the bathroom. If he had been
wearing a shirt, I would have noticed the paper towel, but all I could see were his shoulders and chest. He gently patted
my injury until he deemed it clean and then bandaged it.
When he was done, he stood and pointed at the pizza box. “Do you want me to warm this up?”
If I were decent, I would have said something hospitable like, If you want a hot slice. But I wanted him to leave. I snapped, “I can walk.”
“You can, but you don’t have to.”
He was being so nice, so Gabe, that I couldn’t stand it. “I appreciate you picking me up off the ground and cleaning my wounds,
but . . .” I held the mean words a little bit longer. “I need you to leave.”
“Oh.” Gabe frowned. “I called a few times. I was in the office, so . . .”
“I’m writing.”
“I know, but a text or something . . .” His eyes seemed pensive. He was slowly reading the room. “Alex, it’s been days since
we’ve talked. What’s really going on?”
I shook my head like a petulant child. “I can’t . . .” My words broke up. “I can’t talk about it right now.”
“You’re trembling.”
“Please go, Gabe.” My voice petered out on his name.
He’d been stunned, but he stood his ground. “You’re upset. I’m not leaving you like this.”
“I’m not upset. I’m busy.”
I was lying, and he was hurt. Definitely hurt. “I’ll get my shirt.”
My head hurt from stress and frustration. I raised my hand to my temples and massaged them. When he came out of the laundry
room, he looked more resolute. “I’ll go, but I, uh . . . I thought we were . . .”
“What? A couple?” I shook my head. “You don’t even know me.”
Gabe pulled his shirt over his head. His eyes bored into mine before he asked, “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means I’m not doing the forbidden romance thing.” I sucked in wind and attempted to stand. My knee pulled me back on my
butt. Tears wet my eyes when I said, “I recently found out my father’s name was Hiram Jones.” Saying his name left me exposed
to all the ugliness associated with it.
Gabe scratched his head, looking dumbfounded by all this foolishness. “I had no idea you didn’t know his name.”
“But you knew I was a Chambers from Edisto, though.”
His eyes filled with empathy that I wished was pity. I wanted to be angry with him for being perfect in this moment.
“I knew the day you filled out your employment application. When you told me your mother’s name was Rebecca Chambers, I went
back to some old pictures my parents had from a community festival, and I found a picture of her. I’ve always had pictures
of Hiram. I gathered everything I could find when I was writing the book.”
Gabe’s words felt intimate in a way I wasn’t prepared for. He knew me before I knew myself, and he confirmed it when he added, “You look like your father. It wasn’t hard to put two and two together.”
“And you didn’t think we should talk about it?”
He didn’t say anything at first. He just looked at me like I’d asked him a question about outer space. Then he said, “I wanted
to wait until you read the book, Alex. I realized you’d been lied to. Once you started talking about your family being from
Manning and . . .”
His words trailed off. I wanted to know every thought. “And what?”
He dropped into the chair next to me. “You had this innocent yearning to know about your father.”
“More like naive.” I pushed my head into the back of the chair and pressed my eyes shut for a long time, long enough to process
through some pain. When I opened them, Gabe was waiting, his face open and warm.
“Not naive, Alex. You can’t help what was kept from you.” He drew a long breath before asking, “How did you find out?”
“I’ve been digging since the Ancestry thing.”
“Are you okay?”
Deadpanning him, I said, “No. I’m not okay.” I was so uncomfortable in my skin, in my space with him. He had to leave. “And
I can’t do this right now.”
“Do what?”
“Talk about it,” I said.
“We’re already talking,” Gabe said. “I mean, it seems we’re almost done.”
I rolled my eyes. “You knew months ago. You should have said something.”
“I live in the present, Alex. You know that.”
“That’s such a you thing to say. I just found out my entire history is a lie. So not only am I angry and ashamed, but now I feel foolish and betrayed by you.”
He cracked a smile. “That’s enough adjectives for a chapter.”
“It’s not funny,” I snapped. “You could have done better by me. If you thought my mother had kept me in the dark, why did I have to find out about it in your
book?”
He shook his head. “I don’t know your mother. I don’t know her reasons for anything. I don’t know why she didn’t tell you
the truth. I suspect it has a lot to do with all those adjectives you just used—”
I started to interrupt him because he hadn’t answered my question, but he grabbed my hand and kissed it, stopping my words.
“You’re not your father.”
My words came slower, with less upset over the betrayal and more of the shame I felt. “But I am his daughter, and he was the
worst kind of Gullah man. The worst kind of man, period.”
“And how can I convince you that it doesn’t matter?”
I made a sound that said everything on my mind. “How can it not bother you that he stole your legacy?”
Gabe snatched his head back. “I’ve created my own legacy, and I think I’ve done okay with it.”
“But your father . . .”
“Alex, you read my book. If you didn’t see that I’m healed from that trauma, then you need to read it again.”
“I—”
“Read it again.”
“I already know I can’t do this with you. Our history, the blood between us, is too complicated.”
“Wait a minute . . .” He hiked his thumb at his chest. “Are you breaking up with me over this?”
“I have to.”
“You’re in your feelings. Babe, you’re making this bigger than it has to be. I’m not accepting any breakups or arguments that will lead to one.”
“What about when the other members of your family find out who I am?”
Frustrated, he swiped his hand over his face. “I’m the only Scott who should matter to you.”
“Your entire family lost their land. They will hate me. Trust me, my own family hates me. No one in the Chambers family even
speaks to us.”
“That’s not for you to concern yourself with.”
I heard him, but I didn’t at the same time. I was in my head, thinking of our messy future. Imagining what it would be like
for me during holidays and at family events. Rolled eyes, rude comments rolling off tongues in thick Gullah accents. I would
be a reminder of why they were in Adam’s Run instead of on Edisto Beach, farming the land their ancestors were freed on. The
land they thought would always be in their family. Those folks would curse me.
“You have no business being in a relationship with Hiram Jones’s daughter, Gabe, and you know it.”
“I love you, Alex. It doesn’t matter what your father did.”
I planted my hands on my hips and shrugged through my pain. A tear slipped down my cheek, the salty taste a visceral reminder
of what I was losing. He’d said he loved me. Our relationship never should have gotten this far. It wouldn’t have if I had
known. I wiped my cheek and pulled resolve from my belly. “It will eventually matter.”
He walked to the coffee table and picked up the copy of Seasons and handed it to me. “Read it again and see me. Find me between the pages.” He pressed his lips to my forehead, turned, and walked out of my cabin into the pouring rain.
“I love you, Alex.”
The words were real. I hadn’t imagined them. I went to the door and watched his headlights disappear in the night before closing it.
“I love you, Alex.”
His words were going to play in my head like a melody all night long because I loved him too.