Page 34 of A Summer Thing

There’s something too peaceful, too right, about having her here. Something that embeds itself into the marrow of my bones.

“Quinn would have loved New York,” Declan slashes through my thoughts, her comment taking me off guard. We haven’t talked much about her brother, or Brenna, since last summer. Only small things in passing on the phone or through texts.

“Yeah?” is the only response I can think to give her.

She nods, and though I’m not facing her, I catch the movement in my periphery.

“I think, maybe, subconsciously, it’s why I haven’t explored as much as I would have liked to.

It’s weird being somewhere new without him.

He used to talk about wanting to travel the world, but he never got to see anywhere past California, and it just…

I don’t know… It makes me feel guilty, I guess. ”

Emotions knot in my chest, rising to the surface.

Brenna used to dream of the same. Once, on this very roof.

Arms spread wide; eyes bright in a way they never were anymore.

“It feels like I’m on top of the world up here!

Imagine standing on a rooftop in every city across the globe.

Wouldn’t that be amazing? I bet it all looks the same at night, no matter where you are. ”

I clear my throat. “I know the feeling.” Grief, it numbs with time. But it still comes back for you in the moments you least expect it to. Here, on the rooftop with Declan, for one. Feeling the loss of the life Brenna missed out on just as she’s feeling the same for her brother.

She rolls her head along the back of her chair to face me, and her ocean eyes meet mine. Stray pieces of pink hair float around her face, the rest pulled up in a knot at the crown of her head. It strikes me all over again, how fucking gorgeous she is. Her beauty rivals every goddamn standard.

“How so?” she questions.

I rub a palm against my chest and decide to tread forward with raw honesty. “Last summer. Holding myself back while trying to keep promises that weren’t mine to make in the first place. Not going for what I wanted—the fucking second I knew I wanted it.”

Her gaze searches mine, looking for answers I haven’t yet verbalized.

You, Little D. I’m talking about you.

“It wasn’t the easiest lesson to learn,” I continue, thinking of our downfall last summer.

The accident with Williams and Parker. But more specifically, the way I lost my shit and took it out on her.

She’s long since forgiven me, but I’m not sure I’ve forgiven myself.

Going back to therapy has taken me a long way, though.

A session a week to figure out why the past still had a hold on me, and then to pry the fingers of that grip off me one at a time until I could no longer feel its grasp.

“But I’m grateful I did learn that lesson.

And the takeaway? What kind of lives would we be living if we held ourselves back for the sake of the loved ones we’ve lost?

We can’t do that. They wouldn’t want that for us.

If anything, we have to live bigger, louder, because they weren’t able to. ”

Her eyes gloss over. She shakes her head in an attempt to clear the emotions away, but they linger, a sad smile creeping over her lips. “I know you’re right. We can’t. I wasn’t even trying to, really, but I…” she trails off with a shrug.

“I get it. Trust me. But we’re the ones that hold the choice to do something different— be something different.

” I sound like a goddamn wannabe spiritual guru, but the words hold true regardless.

It doesn’t matter what happens to us, the shit life throws at us, we always have the choice to stand back up and strive for better.

“I’ve only ever told Addy this before, but I…

” She takes a deep breath, steeling herself.

“I was the one who asked Quinn to take his seatbelt off, so he could help me fish out the pencil that rolled underneath my dad’s seat.

And I know it’s not my fault, what happened, but it’s hard not to feel like it was sometimes, too.

Like I’m living a life that was taken away from him.

One that could have been saved if I hadn’t… ”

I give her a swift shake of my head. “You can’t think like that; you can’t blame yourself for how it might’ve happened.

Honestly, fuck the whole everything happens for a reason line of bullshit, because sometimes fucked up things happen to good people for no good goddamn reason at all.

But I do believe some things will happen regardless.

That there’s not much we can do to change the hands of fate. Those outcomes are out of our hands.”

She nods. “I wasn’t wearing my seatbelt either, and the doctors said it might have been what saved my life. It’s messed up how nothing makes sense like that. But I think that’s where the guilt comes in.”

She’s talked about her accident before, but I hate the visual of it. Brenna’s terrified, agonized features replaced by a younger Declan’s. It makes my stomach turn, churning violently.

A chill rocks through me, but I refocus on her words.

“I’m going to tell you something I haven’t told many as well,” I say.

Her brows lift, blue eyes dipping into mine and holding me within their grasp. She makes it so goddamn easy to tell her the things I usually hold tight to the vest. She makes me want to.

“I was pissed at Brenna the night she passed,” I admit. The words feel like a weight being lifted off my chest. My parents know, my brothers, too, but it feels different, more significant, letting her in on one of my darkest secrets.

Her stare widens, ocean eyes glistening and shining with an emotion just out of reach. Pity? Empathy? Understanding? Something tells me it’s all three.

A car passes on the road below, tires splashing through water reeling me from the thought.

“It was because of that anger that Brenna ended up in the car,” I go on.

“I was the one who slammed her door shut, willing her to drive away. And it will never matter that I realized my mistake, immediately turning on my heels to open the door and pull her out of the car, because I realized my mistake a moment too late.”

Our brains pick and choose what stays with you.

I can’t make out her face in that moment, or the words we shouted at each other, or what was happening at that party.

But I remember the sound of that lock—the mechanical click of it.

The visual of it pulling down into the door.

The engine turning over, and the sound of her tires grinding against gravel as they peeled away.

They’re burned onto my brain. Seared into my psyche. A tragic reminder that the choices we make can have severe repercussions.

“I can’t—God, I can’t imagine how that must have made you feel. I’m so sorry, Jude. And I know those words never help ease the things we’ve been through, but I am sorry. You didn’t deserve to lose her like that. It’s unfair.” She shakes her head, tension pulling tight at her features.

I clear my throat. “Sometimes I wonder if it was God’s plan all along.

Her stubbornness, the fights, the stretches of time we went without talking to each other.

On the one hand, I was pissed for losing that time—why, when she was going to be taken from me anyway?

But on the other, if things had been good, and we had loved each other like we had in all the years prior—her death would have broken me in a way I’m not sure I could’ve come back from.

And sometimes, I’m certain it’s the only thing that saved me. ”

A knot forms in my chest. Inches into my throat.

Brenna, she had felt like this light. This ray of sunshine who, despite the shit she dealt with at home, could always make me smile.

Make me slow down and appreciate life, and the relationship we had.

The tables spent so long turning, I hadn’t realized they’d tipped to the other side.

More worse days than good, more fights and less laughter, more heartache than any light the good days could bring.

It was a few weeks after one of our worst fights that I finally snapped out of it, and I realized I didn’t recognize myself anymore. This person who tiptoed around her feelings, her moods. This person that went to great lengths to make her happy, when I was miserable.

We went months without talking after that. If I couldn’t save her, I was going to save myself.

The night of the party, we had only recently started talking again, only recently considering ourselves together, and we were already fucking fighting.

I still had the stubborn hope that we were going to make it through, though.

Until I found out she had been cheating.

She’d been accusing me of cheating on her all week, ironically enough.

Something I never would’ve fucking done.

And that night, the same goddamn night she passed, I found out she had been the one cheating all along.

I never suspected. Not once. She played me for a fool. I made my peace with it, though; I had to. But it took me a long damn time to work through it. It was one thing to grieve; it was a another when I was still so fucking angry with her.

“I used to walk over to that field at night.” I motion a hand in its direction, just down the block.

“And just fucking scream at the sky.” Her gaze follows my line of sight.

“So I know what that’s like, too—blaming yourself.

But Declan, that was not your fault. Not by a long shot.

And your brother wouldn’t want you to blame yourself either. ”

“I know,” she breathes. “Deep down, I do. You know that too, though, right? That it wasn’t your fault?

That there’s nothing you could have done differently?

You don’t deserve to carry that weight with you.

” Tears form in her eyes, and one eventually slips through, diving down her cheek.

The sight twists at me, invisible hands gripping my chest and forcing everything behind it taut.

I don’t want to be the reason for her tears.

No matter the cause. “Life happens, and people fight, Jude. But she knows you loved her, that you cared about her. You know that, right?”

She links her fingers through mine—bare of any ink, polish, or jewelry. The tattooed words written on the inside of mine show beneath hers, standing out against her untouched skin.

Never lose hope.

A phrase that got me through the hardest days. And a phrase that, ironically enough, Brenna always used to say.

Declan’s hand tightens around my own, and I drag my gaze up to meet hers. “My intent was to comfort you, not the other way around,” I say.

She shrugs with half a smile gracing her lips. “Sometimes the words don’t matter as much as knowing you’re not alone.”

Too right. Too fucking right.

And with her, I never feel as if I am.

Around Declan, I can be open. Be myself. Share the darkest parts of my past because she gets it.

Around her, I feel like I can breathe.

______

“She’s beautiful, Little J,” my brother comments as I walk through the door.

A grunt is all I offer him in reply.

Declan just took off in an Uber. One I had to practically force her inside of. It was either she let me pay for her ride or I was going to follow her all the way home myself, so she reluctantly agreed.

But reeling back to my brother’s comment—of course she’s beautiful. She’s fucking gorgeous. And a hell of a lot more than that, too. Smart, talented, kind, caring, strong, raw, real. The list goes on and fucking on and on.

“I like her,” he continues. “Respect her even, for not jumping all over your dick like every other girl who runs your way. And I don’t think she’s playing games, either. She’s making your ass work for it without even knowing she’s doing it.” He chuckles. “Yeah, I really like her.”

I really like her, too.

“You gonna bring her out for the Fourth?” he asks.

I nod. “I think I might. Yeah.” Emotions expand within me.

“Well damn,” he says, wearing a too-knowing grin. “Our littlest brother is bringing a girl home.”

“Maybe.”

“Yeah, maybe,” he mocks, throwing a pillow at me, and I catch it in my grasp before it hits me in the junk.

Taking a seat at the opposite end of the couch from him, I chuck the pillow back in return and nail him between the legs.

He curls forward, white-knuckling the pillow.

“Fucking bastard,” he wheezes, and I bark out a deep laugh.

“I was going to say—it’s good to see you happy.

Smiling with someone new. But now, you can go right off and fuck yourself. ”

My laugh delves deeper, rumbling beneath my chest.

He leans over and messes a hand through my hair. “Nah, I take it back, Little J,” he says. “It’s really fucking nice to see you laughing like this. You’re happy, huh?”

His question tears through me, ripping a cavity straight to my beating heart. I hadn’t stopped to think about it until now. But yeah, I guess he’s right.

I am happy.

And Declan has everything to do with it.