Page 25

“You keep saying that,” Rebecca said, “but you don’t have a reason why .

” She caught my hand, and her expression grew serious.

“Ryan, listen for a second, okay? Because sometimes you get too far in your own head. When you were a kid, you had this barrier, right? And it was a biggie. And yeah, it’s still there, but you climb it every damn day you’re in your workshop building something.

And your workshop is your safe space, and you’ve built this life where you really only socialize with me and the guys, and we’re your safe space too, I get that, but I think that maybe if you actually stepped outside your safe space sometimes, you’d realize it’s not as scary as you’ve built it up to be.

And that you won’t do as badly as you think. ”

My throat ached. I wouldn’t have been able to say anything even if I’d had the words.

“Dad did a number on both of us when he left,” Rebecca said. “Because I look at the string of boyfriends I had when I was a teenager, and those were not good choices, Ry. Those were daddy issues on legs. Remember Trent and his teenage boy mustache? Ew. Like, what the fuck was I thinking?”

I snorted despite myself.

Her smile faded. “Dad didn’t leave because you weren’t good enough, Ryan, or smart enough. He left because he was a cheater, and Mom found out.”

“That summer before he left,” I said, my throat still aching, my voice strained, “he was trying to help me with my homework, remember? And he got pissed at me because I couldn’t get it, and he yelled at me and threw it across the room. I mean, I wasn’t diagnosed yet—”

“No,” Rebecca said firmly. “It was because Mom and him were fighting every day. If it wasn’t the homework, it would have been something else, because he was an asshole who couldn’t step up and be a father just because he was busy failing as a husband.”

I closed my stinging eyes.

Once upon a time, Rebecca was taller than me, and she used to put her chin on top of my head when we hugged. Now it was my chin that rested on her head, but her grip was as tight as ever.

“You’re more than good enough, Ry,” she said. “You’re amazing. I can see it and so can your friends. I just wish you could see yourself the same way that we do.”

I drew in a shaky breath and opened my eyes. “Thanks, Becca.”

“Dad’s a shitty ghost,” she said. “Let him go.”

“I’m trying.”

“I know.” She patted my shoulder and then stepped away and cleared her throat. Her eyes were bright with unshed tears, and I was sure mine were the same. Then she spotted the remains of the pasta bake in the sink. “Ryan!”

“I’ll clean it up,” I said, trying not to laugh at the sudden shift in her attention. “He’s fine with me staying in the cabin, I swear. Now go on, get out of here so I can clean up before he gets back.”

“Make sure you share those cookies, then!”

“I already have been.”

“And come and see us soon,” she said. “Oliver misses you.”

“Oliver is a dog.”

“He has feelings, Ryan!”

“Didn’t you hear?” I nodded toward the cat. “I’m a cat person now. I can’t talk to Oliver anymore. Sorry, I don’t make the rules.”

She rolled her eyes. “I know you don’t have the guts to say that to Oliver’s face.”

I really didn’t. The three-legged former shelter dog Rebecca and Chris had adopted was a sweetheart.

“Fine,” I said. “Next time I visit, I’ll bring some Milk-Bones.”

After Rebecca left, I cleaned up the mess I’d made of lunch and then headed to the workshop with the cat at my side.

I stood in the doorway for a while, trying to imagine working here with another person.

Just a few hours a week, Mr. Carver had said, but the workshop was my sanctuary, and it would be hard to let someone else in, even knowing Elena needed a sanctuary as much as I did. I didn’t want to let her down.

I thought back to what Rebecca had said.

What the hell was I really scared of? Not the paperwork, since she’d help me with that.

My father’s shitty ghost? Okay, so he wasn’t actually dead, but he still managed to haunt us.

Me more than Rebecca, it seemed. Just, first he lost his temper with me that night, and then he left, and then we found out he was having another son.

It hadn’t been about me, but it sure as hell had felt like it.

Still did, when I let myself think about it.

It was an easy calculation for a kid to make, even one with dyscalculia: I wasn’t good enough, so Dad’s replacing me. It hurt then, and it hurt now.

I looked down to discover I’d picked up a round of wood without realizing it.

Probably another alien waiting to be discovered.

Another member of twelve-year-old me’s galactic defense squad.

I grabbed my knife, pulled a chair into the shade outside the roller doors where I could see the lake, and began to whittle.

Except the blade didn’t follow the paths I thought it would.

It wasn’t an alien taking shape under my knife at all—it was a water lily.

For Adam.

I hadn’t been good enough for my dad, but was I good enough for Adam?

I knew that was a question that I couldn’t answer without asking him and without being honest about my dyslexia.

And, until I opened up about it, I was doing him a disservice by assuming it might be a dealbreaker for him.

He wasn’t my dad, wasn’t some of the teachers I’d had, and, most importantly, he wasn’t me .

Because of everyone who’d ever judged me for not being able to keep up with the other kids, who’d thought I was stupid, useless, I was right up there with the worst of them. I’d always been my own worst enemy.

I felt stupid now, because here I was sitting in the doorway of my workshop, beside the cabin I owned and had renovated myself, looking out at a beautiful view of Harmony Lake, and I still didn’t think I was good enough.

I was proud of what I’d accomplished, but that pride somehow wasn’t enough to drown out the feelings of inadequacy that had been hardwired into me when I was a kid.

It was tough as weeds, that sense of shame.

I ran my thumb over the blunt points of the water lily’s petals.

Just like I was doing Adam a disservice by not telling him the truth, I was doing him one by not fighting harder to build my self-esteem.

Because if I believed I wasn’t good enough for him—without even asking him if it was true—then that belief would hollow out the heart of our relationship like termites in the trunk of a tree, leaving it fragile and brittle and then the whole thing would collapse.

When I heard his rental car coming down the driveway, I stood up and brushed the curls of wood shavings off me. I went back inside and set my knife and the water lily down on my workbench, my stomach twisting anxiously. Then I walked through the trees toward the cabin.

He was climbing out of the car when I stepped out of the trees. He straightened up when he saw me, but his face didn’t light up with his customary smile. His expression was cold, rigid, as he stared at me.

“Adam?” I took a few steps toward him, my gaze searching for any injuries to him or damage to the car. Because whatever had happened, he was shaken. I didn’t spot anything obvious though. “Are you okay?”

Of everything I’d thought he might tell me—that he’d been mugged, that his agent had dumped him, that something had happened to his dad—nothing prepared me for what came out of his mouth.

He jutted out his chin, confusion and anger replacing his previously fixed expression. But when he spoke, his voice was as cold as his face had been. “Why does Sam have pictures of the note I gave you on his phone?”

Oh, shit.

No, I hadn’t expected him to say that at all, and it was my turn to freeze.