Those crystal blue eyes…
For a long time, I thought perhaps it was both of us who were the issue—both Finley and me. Yet it turned out, he wasn’t at fault at all. He was able to bear children.
It was me, and only me, who was tragically flawed.
“Grace.”
I heard my name but didn’t flinch. I was frozen. Unable to move, unable to breathe. Unable to do anything but stand still.
“Hey! Snap out of it!” Jackson shouted my way. He placed his hands on my shoulders and shook my body back and forth, making my blurred vision clear somewhat. I looked into his eyes and blinked a few times.
Then came the tears, each one taking its precious time to roll down my cheek.
“She’s pregnant,” I softly spoke, staring into his eyes that weren’t as hard and cold as they usually appeared. “My best friend’s pregnant with my husband’s child.”
“Yeah.” He frowned but not his normal frown. This was built around his pity for me. “I heard.”
“I-I-I…” My eyes faded over, and I only saw black. I couldn’t speak. I couldn’t move. I didn’t know what to do or how to react. All I knew was that this was not a panic attack.
I knew panic attacks.
I knew anxiety, and how it had swallowed me in the past, but this was a new feeling.
This felt like the first moments before the final descent into nothingness.
I’d never forget the moment as I stood there in The Silent Bookshop. It was one of the big moments. One of the ones that truly defined who I’d be from that point on. It was the moment that changed me from the person I’d always been.
It was the exact moment when I lost my last mustard seed of faith. It was the exact moment when I no longer believed in God.
“Come with me,” Jackson whispered.
“But…” I started.
“Princess,” he said, his voice smoky as it always had been. He took my hands into his and lightly squeezed them both. “Come with me.”
And with his guidance, I followed him.
We walked the streets of Chester with my hand in his, and it still felt as if time was frozen. We reached his property, and he took me to the area in the back of the shop where the broken-down car sat.
He stood me in front of the car and then grabbed a pair of safety goggles and placed them over my eyes. Then he grabbed the sledgehammer and handed it my way.
“Okay, he said, nodding toward the vehicle. “Go wild.”
I took a deep breath, pulled the sledgehammer over my head, and slammed it into the car. I kept swinging, unaware of how long I beat the car. I couldn’t stop pounding the metal piece of junk in front of me. I slung the hammer into the back window, shattering the glass as my eyes released a floodgate. I couldn’t see through the goggles, but I kept swinging over and over again, taking all the strength left in my body and releasing it onto the vehicle. I might not have had much left inside me, but I had enough power to release the anger inside me.
“All right,” Jackson stated. “That’s enough.”
But I didn’t stop. I kept pounding away at the balled-up sheet metal.
“Princess, that’s enough,” he said, this time sterner, yet still, I didn’t listen.
Everything inside me ached in a way that I didn’t know could hurt. It was as if my soul was set on fire, and it would be an eternal burn.
I swung the sledgehammer over my head, and when I was unable to swing it down, I turned to see Jackson’s hands gripped around the head.
“Let go,” I ordered.
“No,” he replied.
“Jackson, let go,” I begged, taking off the goggles.
“No.”
“Let go!” I barked, this time with tears falling down my face, my heart racing faster and faster.
“Grace, please…” he whispered, his voice quiet, almost a whisper as he stared straight into my eyes. He moved closer to me, and his fingers landed against mine as he started to loosen my grip. “Let go.”
I released the sledgehammer and took a few steps backward.
Jackson placed the hammer down, and he gave me the most pathetic look.
“I’m okay,” I lied, sniffling. “I’m okay.”
“You’re not.”
“No. I am. Everything’s fine. Everything’s always fine. Everything’s—”
He moved in closer and narrowed his eyes as he stared my way. The closer he got, the more my nerves began to build. “Seriously, I’m okay. I lost it there for a minute, but I’m okay. I’m—”
“You’re bleeding,” he told me.
I am?
He wiped his thumb against my cheek, and when he pulled it back, I noticed the blood resting against his fingertip. Then I felt the sting.
“It’s a deep cut. I think some of the glass from the car must’ve struck you,” he said. “Come to my place. I’ll get you cleaned up.”
I wiped my hand against my cheek and shook my head back and forth a little. “It’s fine. I’m okay. I’m fine.” I kept saying those words over and over again, hoping that I’d somehow start to believe them.
“Come on,” he said, holding his hand out to me. I took his grip, and a chill raced over me as he walked me to his cabin. I didn’t say a word on the whole walk over, mainly because my mind was numb. We walked into the house, and I stood in his living room, where an easel was set up and a piano sat in the far corner of the place. The cabin looked bigger on the inside than it appeared from the outside, and it was a very clean place. The artwork on all the walls, many different paintings of sunrises and sunsets, was all breathtakingly stunning.
“Sit here,” Jackson ordered, leading me to the couch. I did as he said, and he hurried away to get a towel and some Band-Aids. Tucker was quick to come greet me, and when he tried and failed to jump on the couch, I helped him up, and he snuggled right into my lap, wagging his tail.
“Good boy,” I whispered, somehow finding instant comfort.
When Jackson came back, he kneeled in front of me with a warm cloth and placed it against my cheek. I flinched a little, and he frowned. “Sorry,” he muttered.
“It’s fine,” I replied.
We sat in silence as he attended to my wound, and Tucker fell fast asleep in my lap.
“Jackson—”
“Look—”
We spoke at the same time, and I nervously laughed as his fingers brushed against my face. “You first,” I told him.
He swallowed hard. “I didn’t mean for you to get hurt. I’m sorry. I just thought some of the energy you had needed to find an outlet.”
“Is that why you hit the cars? As an energy outlet?”
He didn’t reply.
I lowered my head.
“You might need stitches,” he told me. He cleared his throat, and when he looked up at my eyes, the guilt in that hazel stare made my heart feel as if it were being squeezed. “I’m sorry.”
“No worries,” I said. “I did, after all, make you drop a sledgehammer on your foot, so I assume we’re even,” I joked.
“No, that’s not what I mean.”
He stared at me with a hard look, and his lips stayed turned down into a frown. “I’m sorry for the way I’ve been. For the way I’ve treated you.”
“If I knew all it would take for you to be nice to me was my husband getting my best friend pregnant, I would’ve done that ages ago.” I laughed, but he kept frowning.
“You don’t have to do that.”
“Do what?”
“Laugh when nothing’s funny.”
“Yes, I do, because otherwise…” As he stared at me that way, I had to turn away because I felt my emotions finally catching up with me as my heartbeats slowed down. A small, uncomfortable laugh fell from my lips. “Because otherwise you’re going to be annoyed by me,” I warned him.
“Why?”