I won’t have to enter the cabin to find him. Won’t need to step a single foot inside that haunted house.
“Hey,” he says when I get out of the car, but it sounds more like a question than a greeting.
I waste no time. I want to get home to Eric.
“It was really messed up, what you did to me yesterday, attacking me like that. It’s always been messed up, especially when I was a kid. It’s never once been fun, as you said. Got it?”
He doesn’t blink as he looks at me, but after a moment, he nods. “Yeah,” he says.
“The reason I was here before?” I continue. “Running away from you like that? It’s because I thought you’d kidnapped Astrid Sullivan.” He cocks an eyebrow, lets out a baffled chuckle, but I barrel forward. “You told me at The Diner that you’re a completely different person now, but you’re not, you’re still the same. You’re—”
“An asshole,” Cooper says.
I close my mouth. Open it again. “What?”
He shakes his head. “I swear, I’ve done so much work on myself over the years.” He gazes off into the trees. “Everyone’s got their shit to deal with, you know? And the way I acted yesterday? That shit’s mine. And I am different now, I’m so much better at controlling my impulses, so sometimes I try to act like… like the person I used to be never existed. But the past doesn’t just go away, you know? It’s always there, isn’t it?”
I don’t answer him. But for my own sake, I’m hoping like hell that he’s wrong.
“Anyway,” he says, “I’m sorry, okay? About yesterday. And the way I used to treat you. I know I said at The Diner that it’s not worth apologizing for, but that was just me trying to ignore the past again. So I’m sorry, Brierley. Really. I felt like shit about it all last night.”
The apology stuns me. It’s the first one I’ve heard all day—and it didn’t come from Ted, or from Astrid, but from Cooper, of all people. The same man who, days ago, repulsed me with his words at The Diner, still speaking like a twenty-year-old even at forty. But maybe—somehow—he’s the most grown-up of all the people who have hurt me.
“Thank you,” I say.
I’m about to leave, but my eyes linger on the cabin. I wonder if, soon, the police will be combing through it, looking for evidence of the horrors that happened within its walls. A part of me almost feels guilty that Cooper will lose his project. I can picture the yellow tape now, cordoning off the dilapidated house, labeling it what it was: a crime scene.
As I’m walking back to my car, Cooper calls out to me.
“Hey, Brierley.” I turn around. “I solved the mystery, you know. About the drifter.”
My chest tightens, remembering his dark clothes. “Oh yeah?”
“Yeah. Turns out he is homeless. He’s been sleeping in the cabin at night. Which is so dangerous, but…” He shrugs. “He gets restless. And bored. So he walks all day. He used to be a cross-country coach, before things turned bad for him.”
“And his clothing?” I ask. “The black coat in all this heat?”
Cooper shrugs again. “I don’t know. Maybe it’s all he’s got, and he’s afraid of leaving it behind.” He reaches for a cigarette tucked behind his ear, pulls out a lighter from his pocket. “Or maybe he runs cold. Either way, I think I’m gonna give him this place once I fix it up. He’s a pretty good dude. Really shy. But good.”
“You’d give up the money you could get from flipping it?” I ask. The thought seems so strange—a generosity I didn’t know him to be capable of.
He puts the cigarette between his lips. Lights it and inhales.
“It’s not about the money,” he says. I can almost see his words in the smoke he breathes. “It’s about strengthening a home from the inside out. Making something beautiful out of everything that’s ruined.”
* * *
It’s dark when I get back to Boston, but inside our loft, it’s light. Eric springs off the couch as soon as I open the door. Every lamp we own is on.
When he folds me into his arms, I allow myself to let go of everything I’ve been keeping in. It’s a deluge. A hiccupping flood. His shirt is wet from my tears. My cheek is wet from his shirt. He leads me to the couch, and I continue to cry. He holds me as I do.