But when she leaned back, still in his arms, and registered the little lines beneath his eyes, she remembered the years that had stretched into a decade since they last met, and the echo stopped short. She stepped out of his embrace, her cheeks pinker than they had any right to be.
“Before you start yelling, I brought something for you. Just let me give it to you first, and then you can attack.” He took a small blue box out of his back pocket and handed it to her as her eyes narrowed. There was a clear cutout in the top and nestled there in white satin was …
“You brought me a tiny spoon?” she asked, vacillating between confusion and incredulity.
“I remember you saying how much you loved when your grandad would bring one to Gigi. You said that even though you never wanted to leave Poppy Meadows, you liked the thought of having little pieces of the world. And I went to a conference a few years ago in Texas and saw it, and—look, I know it’s about ten years too late,” he said. “I’m sure you hate me. I’d hate me too. I was an ass. But I was young. And stupid. And didn’t know what I wanted. Not that that’s an excuse. I’ve apologized to you in my head twenty times in the last ten years, but I was too much of a coward to do it in real life.”
The longer he spoke, the more the initial glow at seeing him turned to ash. She hated him for remembering that. For it softening her toward him now, when all she wanted to feel was righteous anger.
“I trusted you,” she said in a quiet voice. “And you ruined me.” She’d been waiting to say that for ten years. But now that the words were out, they didn’t make her feel better, like she’d hoped they would. “Do you know how hard it is for me to trust people? Do you know how much you screwed me up?” she demanded. As soon as the words were out, she winced. He wasn’t the only one to blame. She’d held on too long. And as always, she said too much around him, revealed too much. He was the one person she’d allowed herself to lean on, to tell her truth to, show her mess to. And then he’d left. She’d sacrificed her self-control for him, and when he’d gone, she vowed that no one would hold that power over her again.
“I know.” He ran a hand through his hair, his face a reflection of the anguish Sadie used to feel every single day. “I just thought, maybe, I could try to earn your forgiveness. You were my best friend, Sade. And I didn’t … I shouldn’t have left like that.”
A hundred thoughts were at war in Sadie’s head. The dark part of her longed to lash out and punish him. The rational side said they could be friends and leave it at that. And the emotional side that she constantly tried to keep hidden whispered that it was impossible. Control. She had to fight for control. Everything in her life belonged in neat little rows and columns. There were no surprises—only managed expectations. And here he was, obliterating them.
What she really wanted to do was to yell at him. To unleash the wild inside her that she usually channeled into dirt or dough. But she had to shut it down. She hadn’t needed anyone for ten years. She wasn’t going to start again now.
“What do you want, Jake? I can’t just let you back in,” she said finally, hating the note of brokenness that had weaseled its way in there without permission.
“I’m not asking you to. I just … needed to apologize.”
The ground grew warm beneath her feet, the heat snaking up her legs until it wrapped around her chest and squeezed her heart. It was fall. The air should have been crisp. Instead, the stillness she’d come home to earlier had turned even warmer, and she swore she could smell honeysuckle. Like her garden was trying to make her remember the summer she’d fallen in love with him. As if her brain needed the encouragement. Jake’s hand rested on the fence, his fingers curled over the top. He looked like a permanent fixture. Like he’d been wandering around in a fog and had finally found the lighthouse.
The thought of seeing Jake every day for the next decade made her blood jump. The ground was steaming now and rose in tendrils around her legs. He glanced down and jumped back.
“You should go,” she told him, proud of herself for sounding firm, even though her hands were trembling by her side. “I need time to think.”
“I understand,” he said softly, staring sadly into her eyes.
She remembered every amber fleck hidden in there, but forced herself to ignore them.
“I want to be friends,” he continued, although his voice came off pained. “Do you think we can, eventually?”
“I don’t know,” she whispered, refusing to look at him. “I hope so. Maybe.”
She turned away before she could do something she’d regret, like forgiving him on the spot or screaming at him or giving in to the memories and the way her heart still ached for him. For the first year after he’d left, she wouldn’t let herself think about a reunion. It was a Revelare fact that daydreaming about the desires of your heart was the surefire way to make certain they never came true. The second year was harder. She imagined the obscenities she’d yell at him. The third year she dreamed of the ways she’d make him pay if he came back asking forgiveness. On his knees. She’d played the scenario out in her head so many times in so many different ways, it felt like a soap opera on repeat.
Most times she imagined yelling at him until she was hoarse. Other times she thought about refusing to even acknowledge him. But her favorite scenarios, the ones she rarely let herself think about because kindness was her kryptonite, were when he showed up unannounced while she was gardening, with a bouquet of flowers in his hands and an apology on his lips. And yes, it was a spoon instead of flowers, but it seemed her daydreams had some power after all. Only in her head these imaginary encounters ended up with a lot less clothing involved.
After a few moments, she heard the crunch of gravel as he walked away. When she turned around again, he was at the sidewalk. By the time he was out of sight, some of the feeling had come back into her legs. She exhaled an unstable breath. Maybe Raquel was right, and she was a glutton for punishment. But the little blue box felt heavy in her hand as she lifted the lid, and her fingertips grew warm as she ran them over the cool metal. Three inches in length, the handle had a background of white, red, and blue, with the outline of Texas and a horned bull laid over. She loved it. She didn’t want to tuck it away. Gigi had always let her use her grandfather’s spoons for fake potions and feeding her dolls because she said special things were meant to be used and treasured instead of simply stared at. She wanted to use this spoon to stir sugar into her coffee and reflect on the fact that Jake had been thinking about her while he was gone. She nestled the spoon carefully back in its home and slipped the box in her back pocket, where it felt like a sort of talisman.
She glanced in the direction of Rock Creek House just once before shaking herself. Memories wouldn’t get her anywhere. She had work to do.
Her knees sunk into the earth as she pulled weeds, dirt embedding itself under her fingernails since she refused to wear gloves. She pulled a clump of Queen Anne’s lace and shivered as she remembered the feel of Jake’s arms around her after so long.
Damn it damn it damn it.
She knew she was screwed.
Her weeding paused when she reached the smattering of pastel gladioli that towered like a stack of bonbons dusted with sugar. Remembrance.
The stalks swayed toward her in an enticing dance. Setting down her garden shears, she plucked a bell-shaped bloom and squeezed a drop of juice from the petals, the taste sweet on her tongue.
She had to remember. The pain. She couldn’t forget; there was far too much at risk. He wanted to be friends—and that’s exactly the same trap she’d found herself in before.
But as the fog rose up around her vision, it wasn’t Jake she saw, but a series of dark symbols at the bottom of a lukewarm, blue-patterned teacup.
As her eyes closed, a looming flutter of white appeared again from the forest.