“Lunch was wonderful. Thanks for including me.”
Mark nodded. “Of course.” He smiled again, but he glanced away and cleared his throat. When he looked back, he seemed uncomfortable. “I’m sorry about Hilde’s … behavior the other day.” Mark studied me for a moment, clearly gauging my reaction. “She told me… It’s just, Hilde’s pretty protective of Helene. And you…” He trailed off, staring at me again. “Well, Helene went through a really tough time when you left. And I think Hilde is just worried about her. I hope you won’t take it personal.”
I contemplated saying nothing, but morbid curiosity got the better of me. “What was she like after I left?”
Mark’s eyebrows shot up, but he was staring at the floor in some long lost memory. “You sure you want to talk about this?” He leaned back against the nearby workbench, crossing his ankles and clearly willing to entertain my curiosity.
I nodded.
He shrugged. “She fell apart. It was … confusing. I mean, of course she missed you. You were her best friend, but… I don’t know… There was more to it than that. At least I’ve always thought so. She quit her job at the gas station—just up and refused to go. Stopped eating, was having nightmares. There were days her parents couldn’t even get her out of bed to go to school. They were calling us at college almost daily, panicking about her. She lost a lot of weight, stopped taking care of herself.” He shook his head, looking at the ground again. “It was bad.”
I tried to swallow, but it stuck in my throat like a wad of dry shame that just wouldn’t go down.
“When Hilde and I came home for Christmas break, I honestly didn’t know if Hilde would come back to school with me. She was devastated when she saw how bad Helene had gotten. I don’t know…” He glanced away. “Her parents dragged her to one shrink after another, put her on antidepressants, begged her to talk, but…” He shrugged again.
I nodded, trying to act normal, but inside my body was groaning, and I felt like I needed to double over in pain. Why the fuck had I asked about this?
Mark looked up at me, and his face fell. “I’m sorry, Kane. You can’t blame yourself. There was more going on than just you leaving. I’m certain of it.”
I took a deep breath. “I left her when she needed me. I wasn’t here for her. And I can absolutely blame myself for that.”
Mark shook his head. “You were just a kid yourself. You can’t make yourself responsible for her. Whatever this thing was with her, you can’t blame yourself for that.”
I scoffed, but there wasn’t an ounce of humor to it. The man had no idea how responsible I was for this. “Yeah.” I wasn’t agreeing with him. I simply wasn’t willing to delve into the inevitable conversation that would ensue if I disagreed. “How long was she like that?”
He smirked. “Should we be having this conversation?”
I crossed my arms, nodding as I looked away.
“Why haven’t you talked to her about this?”
“I guess there are some things I’m not ready to bring up yet. A lot of things actually,” I muttered. A whole fucking lot of things. “I don’t think she would tell me the truth anyway.”
“Wouldn’t you like to get to the point where she can talk to you about this?”
I nodded. “It’s a difficult subject.”
“And yet, you’re both here.” He tossed a tarp over the smoker, and when he turned around, he smiled again. “She came out of it eventually. Can’t say she’s ever been the same Helene I knew before this … spell. She was always a good student, as you well know, but by the time she came out of this … thing her grades had started slipping. She became obsessive about her studies then. Driven to the point of absurdity in my opinion. Of course, her parents and even Hilde saw it as a great sign that she was getting better, but … I don’t know. It seemed to replace everything else—friends, activities, even family. She just wasn’t the same.”
We were silent for a moment.
She was no more the same Helene than I was the same Kane. I missed us. Both of us. But I also loved this Helene as much as the old. I loved seeing how she coped, how she fought her way through it. She likely wouldn’t appreciate that. Her life didn’t feel pretty to her after all, but I was still amazed by it.
It didn’t mean a single second of this conversation wasn’t painful.
“Something more happened, didn’t it?” Mark wasn’t asking the question. He was asking for confirmation of what he already believed, and his face was stone serious as he studied me.
I nodded before I realized my head was moving.
Mark’s lips pursed. “I’m sorry,” he said quietly. “Whatever it was, it clearly affected you too.”
“Daddy,” a little voice came from the open garage door.
I turned to see Brody standing there.
“Will you come read with me?”
Mark walked to the little boy, scooping him up in his arms. “Of course, buddy.” Mark glanced at me over his shoulder, and he smiled.