Page 81

HAYES
My hands were shaking on the handlebars as I drove out of town. I knew I couldn’t be by myself, or I was liable to do something stupid. Especially with whatever mangled pieces remained of my heart feeling like they were being ripped out of my chest.
I couldn’t think clearly. The second I saw those boxes, I panicked. I was five years old again, showing my mom a drawing in the hopes of making her smile. I’d thought my drawing was good enough then, just like I thought my best was good enough for Della now.
I knew I could never trust a woman to love me, to stay.
With the lights of Cottonwood Falls in the rearview mirror, I felt stupid for thinking I was enough for Della. She knew I wasn’t worth staying for, even when I was giving her my all.
My dad had told me to give love a chance. That I could be happier than before. But for the second time in my life, the woman I loved was leaving me. And unlike my mom, this was a choice—Della’s choice.
I drove, almost in a trance, only the sound of wind raging past my helmet and the dirt road under my tires until I reached the big white house out in the countryside. I got off my bike and pulled out my cell, dialing Fletcher’s number. His girls were asleep—hell, he might be too—but I needed to talk to him.
After a few rings, he answered, groggy. “Hayes. Everything okay?”
“No,” I uttered. “Can you come outside?”
“You’re here?”
“I am.”
He hung up, and a few seconds later, the front porch light came on and he walked outside in pajama pants and a crumpled white T-shirt. His hair was a mess, and there was the imprint of a blanket on his cheek. I was pacing his front sidewalk, feeling like a caged animal. How could my body hold all this pain? It felt like it could split me apart, rip me to a thousand ragged pieces at any second.
There was a worried look in my brother’s dark eyes. “What happened?” he asked.
“Did you know Della was moving?” I asked.
His hesitation was all the answer I needed.
The panic welled up making my legs weak. I slumped to the ground, too overwhelmed by my emotions to even stand.
“Hayes!” he uttered and rushed to me where I’d fallen. “Where does it hurt?”
“Everywhere!” I whimpered, keening and holding myself. “It hurts everywhere.”
Fletcher tugged me into his arms like I weighed nothing. “You’re scaring me. Did you take something? Are you wounded?”
I held on to him. “I love her, and she’s leaving.” Now the sobs came. It felt like I couldn’t stop, couldn’t catch my breath. It was worse than any injury. Instead of my body failing, it was like the world was coming apart. Everything I’d hoped for, the future my mind had dared to picture for Della and me—it was all gone, broken down like those moving boxes waiting in her spare room.
Fletcher said, “I’m here.” He rubbed my back and waited until I couldn’t cry anymore. “Let’s go to the guesthouse. Get you inside.”
Even though I didn’t see the point in being inside or outside, I let him tug me up and leaned on him heavily as he helped me stand on legs that didn’t feel like my own. And we walked slowly across the gravel path to the guesthouse in his backyard. He opened the door for us and flicked on the lights. “Sit at the counter,” he said, “I’ll make us some coffee.”
Never mind the fact that Fletcher always pressed that no one should drink caffeine after noon. “I’m not drunk,” I told him.
“I know,” he said, his back to me as he pressed a filter into the pot.
I watched while he started the pot brewing, slowly and methodically. “She told you about the move tonight?” he asked, his face still turned away from me.
“No, I found the boxes packed in her guest room after we...”
I could see the sympathy in his eyes as he asked, “How did it go after that?”
I relayed the story to him, almost like I was an observer instead of a participant. And when I was done, he had two cups of coffee. He stood on the opposite side of the counter, sipping his drink while I just stared down at the dark liquid and the few bubbles sitting on the top.
“I need you to text her and tell her when you’ll meet up again to discuss this,” Fletcher said in his official doctor tone. He’d used it on us all the time as the oldest of five brothers.
“Why?” I asked.