“Will you tell me what exactly happened? Because I’m not really sure.”
He took a deep breath and released it slowly. “What you did, arranging the trip and everything, it was a really nice thing for you to do. I’ll always be sorry that I reacted the way I did.”
Ella had so many questions that she didn’t ask. She needed him to tell her what this was about. She needed him to want to tell her.
“Ever since Caleb died,” he began haltingly, “I’ve struggled with where I fit among the friends we shared. It’s really hard for me to be around them. More than anything, the time I spend with them reminds me so profoundly of what’s been lost. They’re great guys, the best guys I’ve ever known. I love every one of them. They’re our very best friends, and yes, they were and are our friends, not just his. Despite how it might seem sometimes, I really do know that.”
He released her hands and turned to face the water. “As much as I love them, and as much as I loved Caleb . . . They’re a bunch of crazy bastards. Some of the shit we’ve done would give you gray hairs if you knew about it. They’re always pushing the envelope, coming up with new ways to challenge themselves and each other. A lot of that came right from Caleb, the craziest of the crazy. There was nothing he wouldn’t do, especially if someone dared him. I once saw him jump from the top of a waterfall, having no idea what was on the bottom.”
Ella crossed her arms against a sudden chill, which was odd because the night air was warm and humid.
“Scared the fucking shit out of me when he did stuff like that. The rest of them, they just went along with whatever he cooked up. You name it, we’ve done it. We’ve outrun avalanches on mountains and zip-lined in the jungle, jumped out of perfectly good airplanes. They’ve been talking lately about climbing a mountain somewhere. The e-mails and texts from that crew would make for a good reality TV show.”
As Ella listened to him, she began to get an idea of where this was headed—and then he confirmed it for her.
“I can’t do that shit anymore,” he said softly. “I just can’t take those kinds of chances. I can’t do it to my parents.”
Drawn to him the way she always was, Ella laid her hand on his back and leaned her head against his shoulder. “Why didn’t you just say so?”
“Because I’ve never said it to anyone before. I’ve never come right out and acknowledged that I’m unwilling to go along with their crazy shit anymore because my parents have already lost one son senselessly. I’ll be damned if they’ll lose another.”
“Gavin . . . Anyone would understand that.”
“I don’t think the guys would understand. They’d call me a * and say I’m a chickenshit, which would piss me off and make me forget why I can’t do whatever it is they want me to do. It’s just easier for me to keep my distance than to resist their crazy ideas.”
“So you cut yourself off from people you love rather than just tell them what you told me? That doesn’t make sense.”
“Maybe not, but it’s how I’ve coped. When you told me about the wedding, that’s what I was thinking about. It wasn’t about you or coming here with you, despite how it might’ve seemed. My coping mechanism was threatened, and I lashed out at you, which was the wrong thing to do. It was the worst thing I could’ve done, and I’m sorry. I hope you can forgive me.”
“I already have,” Ella said. How could she not when he spelled it out so plainly?
“You have?” He turned back to face her, stepping closer. “Really?”
“Yes, really.”
“Thank God, Ella. Thank you for understanding. I promise this will never happen again. I was such an ass. I’m so sorry.”
“It will happen again.”
“But wait, you just said . . . You understand.”
“I understand what happened the other night, and I appreciate you coming here and clueing me in as to what went so wrong. That answers a lot of questions for me.”