“That’s it exactly,” she said, giving my fingers a squeeze.
“But you haven’t exactly given him a chance to ask for forgiveness, have you?” She didn’t answer, kept her eyes on that diamond, finally closing her eyes like she couldn’t stand to look at it anymore. I could relate. “Something else I’ve learned from you over the years, from Kona too: you want to live a happy life, you fight for it.”
Blinking again, Keira looked at me as though she wasn’t sure what she should say to me. There was less loss in her expression, less insult at being fed a meal of truth she clearly wasn’t interested in. But beyond that was confusion—that came in the soft lines denting across her forehead and how she pressed her lips together. “But you didn’t fight. You left.”
It wasn’t an accusation and I didn’t take it as one. For four years Keira had not asked what had really happened between us. She’d never asked more than how I liked my condo or if I minded Ransom being with her when she visited. They hadn’t known, none of them, that Ransom came to me after the break up. I didn’t want him mentioning it. I didn’t think giving his family some small hope that things had changed was fair. Keira had kept her friendship with me despite the distance between her son and I. Despite the fact that she knew my leaving had hurt him.
“I fought, cheri, for as long as I could. He just wouldn't listen, had too many other things pulling at him, and I was rarely at the top of the list—unless he had a night off. I yelled, he apologized, then went back and did the same thing again. He made promises, then broke them. I finally put down an ultimatum and he stepped over it like it wasn't even there. I loved him, I really did, still do, but, well...” I looked out across the lake. “Despite what the poets say, love can only go so far.”
The wind and the chill and the choppy water, the sight of Keira wrapped up in that old blanket, the feel of her heartache, the idea of words not spoken, of secrets withheld, all these churned in the pit of my stomach. This woman had shared with me her worst fears. Wasn’t it time I shared mine with her? “But it wasn't just that. Honestly, I can’t lay this all at Ransom’s feet. Something happened.... there’s something that.... I....” I didn’t know how to go on. I wasn’t sure I wanted to.
“Aly…” Keira’s voice was soft, cautious, but she didn’t keep quiet. “What really happened? Why did you really leave?”
Looking at her—that sweet, open expression, the concern I knew she felt despite her own worry, despite how desperately scared she was that her marriage was unraveling, Keira still wanted me to talk to her. She’d seen me struggle. She’d seen me trying to fight against my instinct to cling closer to the past. She’d claimed to understand when Ethan first asked me on a date. I’d kept all of this to myself for so long that the ache of it was familiar—like a knot in the center of your chest, something that pains you but you’re sure will eventually disappear. The truth, the reality of feeling like a failure, the disappointment that I couldn’t give Ransom what I knew he wanted, it had all taken root inside me. It had sat there, a burning ache that I’d learned to disregard. Now Keira was giving me the chance to chip away at that ache.
My gaze hadn’t moved. I looked over her face like it was an anchor, like she was, keeping my head above water from the weight of this burden. When her grip on my hand tightened, I knew she’d keep me from drowning.
“It…you remember the cramps, all that summer before I left when we went to Maui? I was miserable.”
“Ransom took you to the ER, I remember that.”