Page 80 of The Matchmaker Club

My grandmother pulled her aside. “Let her go.”

Still in bare feet, I ran across the lawn and onto the trail. Rocks and pine needles pinched the soles of my feet and my toe stubbed on a tree root, but I kept going. I hadn’t been down this trail since Austin, but I still knew the way like the back of my hand. The trickling water of the creek rushed through my ears. I knew once I got to the hill, I’d see Lucas by the cedar tree.

And there he was. Sitting against the tree, looking more heartbroken than when I’d first met him.

I walked over and sat down beside him. He didn’t say anything for a bit, and I let him have that moment.

“I’m so sorry,” he finally said.

I hugged my arms around my knees. “It wasn’t your fault.”

“It was.”

I placed my hand on his arm and looked him in the eyes. “It wasn’t.”

He sucked in a deep breath and let it out before leaning his head against the tree. “I read my calling letter.”

“You don’t have to tell me about it if you don’t want to.”

“No, I do.”

The crickets stole the moment of silence between us.

“What did it say?” I asked.

“It wasn’t about romance, but it did involve a broken heart.”

“What happened?”

He rubbed his hand across his mouth. “He’s a kid, a teenager, I think. His mother just died, and he’s closing off. He wants to pretend she never existed because the other option hurts too much.”

“Oh.” I let out a deep breath. “Wow.”

“Yeah.” He fiddled with the pine needles between us on the ground. “Did you know I lost my mother as well?”

Every muscle in my body stiffened. “No.”

“She died when I was a baby. Aneurysm. I don’t remember anything about her. My brother does, very little, but he remembers.” He choked on the last words, as if swallowing down an ache I knew all too well. “I’ve tried. Wracked my brain just to know one piece of her.” He grabbed a stone and threw it into the creek. “But there’s nothing.”

“I don’t remember my mother, either,” I admitted.

“You don’t?”

“No. But I have my grandma and Lainey to tell me about her.”

“And the tapes she made you.”

I turned away. “Yes.”

“Your home is filled with her… like that painting of the sunflower field in your parlor. The tray that holds the Matchmaker letters. Her lamp.”

“What do you know about your mother?” I asked.

He shrugged. “My father doesn’t talk about her, never has, but my grandfather loved her. He said she wasn’t like my stepmother. Complete opposite. Carefree, like she didn’t belong in our world. Too good for it, he said.”

“So that’s where the dare in you comes through.”

He cracked a smile. “Could be, but I have too much of my father in me.” He fished out another rock and tossed it into the water.