Page 206 of The Fall

I laugh softly, trying to see the pattern he’s pointing out. Our arms brush as I lean closer.

“I stopped looking up after he died.” He stretches out on his back on the sand, and I lay beside him, our shoulders touching.

“I wish Cody could have met you,” he finally says, so softly.

“Tell me about him?”

“He was trouble.” Blair lets out half a laugh. “He was a pain in the ass, but he was my pain in the ass, you know?” A breath rattles in his lungs. “He was funny. Quick with comebacks. And loyal, so loyal. He’d fight anyone who said a word against me, even when I deserved it.” He pauses. “He played guitar. He could talk to anyone. He loved knock-knock jokes.”

I reach for his hand.

“He lived with me, before…” Blair breathes in and holds it. “After things fell apart overseas. The team cut him when they found out about the drugs.”

His hand tightens around mine. I let him squeeze as hard as he needs.

“He wanted to quit,” Blair says, voice brittle at the corners. “He really wanted to, you could tell. So I had this routine all worked out. We were together nonstop. Working out, playing ball hockey, eating together.” His voice twists. “I guess… I thought I could be enough to replace that shit.”

Sand shifts beneath me as I roll toward him.

“Then the season started,” Blair says. “And I was away more. Practice, preseason...” His voice has gotten so small. “He couldn’t hold on.”

His face is half in shadow, half illuminated by fading embers and dying coals.

“Our last conversation was a huge fight. I came home early from practice because I had a bad feeling, and I got home as fast as I could. I found him high and wrecked in my living room. I wassofucking angry, Torey. So fucking angry. I raged at him?—”

His breath catches, and he’s silent for a long, long time.

“He told me he wished he could make me happy again.” A tremor rides through his voice, a ripple beneath his words. “And I told him if he wanted me to be happy, all he had to do wasstopusing.”

The ocean is black glass, barely breathing.

“I told him to get his shit together and that was the last...” He trails off, his throat working. “Two days later, the police called the team during morning skate?—”

Blair stops, staring at the stars. His chest rises and falls, rises and falls.

“He was in the park,” he finally manages. “On a bench.”

Everything in me gives way. I have a paper soul, torn loose and fluttering. The surf crashes, eats another line of beach. “I’m here,” I whisper.

“I keep thinking about what I could have, should have, done differently,” Blair says. “If I’d been calmer. If I’d gone after him.”

“Blair—”

“I was supposed to protect him. That was my job.”

“You loved him?—”

His laugh is soundless. “Not enough, clearly. I failed him. I missedsomething. I feel crazy sometimes, like if I replay every second maybe I’ll see what went wrong, or I’ll know what to say?—”

There are no words large enough, or strong enough, or soft enough for this. I move closer, pushing my forehead to his temple. I squeeze his hand until I feel bone. “Youlovedhim.”

“And it wasn’t enough,” he whispers.

“It was. It was, Blair.” There’s nothing I can say that can ever be enough. My words are useless against a wound this deep. The only thing I have to offer is my solidness, the steady beat of my heart against the night.

The sea sighs against the shore, a long, drawn-out exhalation, and a tremor runs through him. He turns his cheek into mine. “You know what scares me most about loving you? That I’ll fuck it up the same way. I’m terrified of missing something important again and—” Blair’s grip tightens. His fear seeps into my bloodstream, echoes between my heartbeats. “I’m so fucking scared of losing you.”

“You won’t lose me.” My words barely climb over the breakers. They’re small things to offer, smaller still in the face of everything he’s already lost.