he took mine in.
I hoped like hell he saw everything I’d just realized, but if he didn’t, that was okay.
I had forever to prove it to him. “I love you, Hudson Valentine.”
His forehead fell to mine and a puff of breath skated over my cheeks.
“Always,” he whispered, “I will always love you, Lilly.”
Epilogue
Lilly
Almost Seven Months Later
The sun beat down, bursting onto my bared shoulders and the tip of my nose. In the far-off distance, a line of cars behind a hearse were visible. Mourners crowded near a patch of grass, many bundled together beneath a forest green tent, the color of the rolling, grassy area of the cemetery. Even from this distance, the grief of those who hugged themselves to each other was palpable. Tears dripped down my cheeks as I took them in. I felt their pain from a quarter-mile away, sensed their despair, and my eyes dropped to the granite stone before me.
“I miss you,” I whispered, choking over the words I’d kept to myself for so long.
For years, I’d imagined this moment.
Next to me, Hudson’s firm grip on my own hand was a steadying contrast to the wobbling of my knees.
“He would love you,” I rasped out. My head fell to his shoulder and his hand holding mine let go to wrap around my waist and press me against him. His body was warm from the sun and all that was him.
“I would have liked to know him,” Hudson said, and his lips pressed to my temple.
“He was a mess. Always a mess, but such a damn good guy.”
“He loved you. In his own way.”
“I know.” I nodded because I did. I knew that now.
Stepping forward, Hudson’s hand fell from my back and I took the slow steps toward the stone in front of me. The stone I hadn’t been around to see when it was installed. The burial and funeral I hadn’t been allowed to attend.
Joshua Nathan Huntington, Jr. was scripted in elegant lettering above the dates of his life.
At the right corner was a fresh bouquet of flowers I’d brought with us. Red and white roses that burst with color against the gray slab.
I was finally able and willing to come say goodbye to my brother and while the trip to Chicago had been relatively easy, my pulse was still skittering at abnormal rhythms. After finding out my father was in the hospital and the brutal call I had with my mom, we threw the letters I’d written to them away in our building’s dumpster outside so I wouldn’t be tempted to retrieve them. Slowly, I worked to let them go because I was still living by the truth I learned the night that call happened.
I had always deserved more than what my parents had given me. Now, I had it, and I would hold it close, treasure it and care for it for every day I had with them.
Hudson, next to me, tall and brave, my warrior and my fighter and my lover. Most of all, he was simply mine.
When he asked me what I wanted for my birthday, all I could think of was everything I had, everything I’d lost and I knew the final step to truly putting my past where it belonged, was to face it.
So there we were, a funeral service happening in the distance, and me, finally able to see where Josh was buried and say my goodbyes to him.
Hudson stayed with me while I thought of all of this before realizing I had nothing left to say to Josh, nothing left to let him know.
I tilted my head back, unable to see his dark eyes peering down on me, but I could feel his gaze like a physical touch behind his sunglasses.
“I’m ready.”
He took my hand and squeezed. “Are you sure?”
I glanced at the family waiting behind us. Those who had heard where we were going, what I wanted to do and insisted they came with us.
Because that’s what family did. They supported you and were there for you to lean on when you went through difficult times and they all knew how difficult this would be for me.
It was… and yet it wasn’t, because as I was learning over the last several months, I’d made peace with Josh’s death a while ago. I’d already said my goodbyes and let the guilt of my own involvement the night he died go. It was an accident. A horrible accident caused by kids who might have known better but it’d