He ground his teeth together as he waited for my answer. I dropped my gaze, tears filling my eyes. I shook my head, and begged, “Please … don’t…”
Rune ran his hand down his face. That stubborn expression I knew so well spread across his features. “No! God, Poppy. Why? Why did you do it?”
I was momentarily distracted by the thickness of his accent, a raspier husk in his already low, graveled voice. As a child, over the years here his Norwegian accent had diminished some. But now, his English was overlain by a heavy Nordic edge. It reminded me of the day we met outside his house, aged five.
But as I saw his face redden with anger, I was quickly reminded that right now that didn’t matter. We weren’t five anymore. Nothing was innocent. Too much had happened.
And I still couldn’t tell him.
“Poppy,” he insisted, his voice rising in volume, as he stepped even closer. “Why the hell did you do it? Why did you never call me back? Why did you all move? Where the hell have you been? What the hell happened?”
Rune began to pace, his muscles bunching under his t-shirt. A cold wind blew through the grove and he raked back his hair. Stopping dead, he faced me and spat out, “You promised. You promised me that you’d wait for me to come back. Everything was fine, until one day I called and you didn’t answer. I called and I called, but you never replied. Not a text, nothing!”
He moved until his booted feet were right against mine, towering over me. “Tell me! Tell me right now.” His skin was mottled with the redness born of his anger. “I deserve to goddamn know!”
I flinched at the aggression in his voice. Flinched at the venom in his words. Flinched at the stranger standing before me.
The old Rune would never have spoken to me like this. But then I reminded myself this wasn’t the Rune of old.
“I-I can’t,” I stuttered, barely above a whisper. Lifting my eyes, I saw the incredulous look on his face. “Please, Rune,” I begged, “Don’t push this. Just leave it.” I swallowed, then forced myself to say, “Leave us … leave us in the past. We should move on.”
Rune’s head snapped back as though I had punched him.
Then he laughed. He laughed, but the sound held no humor. It was laced with fury, coated with rage.
Rune stepped one pace backward. His hands shook at his sides and he laughed one more time. Icily, he demanded, “Tell me.”
I shook my head, trying to protest. He lifted his hands to his hair in frustration. “Tell me,” he repeated. His voice had lowered an octave and radiated menace.
This time I didn’t shake my head. Sadness had rendered me motionless. Sadness at seeing Rune like this. He was always quiet and withdrawn. His mamma had told me on more than one occasion that Rune had always been a sullen child. She had always feared he would give her trouble. She had told me that his innate predisposition had been to snap at people and to keep himself to himself. Even as a child she noticed an air of moodiness about him, his inclination to be negative instead of positive.
But then he found you, she said. He found you. You taught him, through your words and actions, that life didn’t always have to be so serious. That life was to be lived. That life was one great adventure, to be lived well and to the full.
His mamma had been right all along.
I realized, as I watched the darkness exude from this boy, that this was the Rune Mrs. Kristiansen had expected—no, feared—he would become. This was the innate moodiness she knew was harbored below the surface of her son.
A predilection to darkness, not light.
Staying quiet, I decided to turn away. To leave Rune alone with his rage.
Moonbeam hearts and sunshine smiles. I ran my mamaw’s mantra through my head. I squeezed my eyes shut and forced myself to repel the pain trying to flood in. Tried to stave off this ache in my chest, the ache that told me what I didn’t want to believe.
That I had done this to Rune.
I made to move forward, to leave, self-preservation seizing control. As I did, I felt desperate fingers wrap around my wrist and spin me back around.
Rune’s pupils had all but consumed his crystal-blue irises. “No! Stand right here. Stand right here and tell me.” He took in a long breath, and, losing all control, he shouted, “Tell me why the hell you left me all alone!”
This time, his anger was unbounded. This time, his hard words contained the force of a slap to the face. The blossom grove before me blurred; it took me a while to realize that it was my tears clouding my vision.
A tear fell to my cheek. Rune’s dark gaze didn’t waver.