you try to deal with it on your own instead of asking for help.” His father looked off into the distance. “George never asked me for help. Hell, I didn’t even know he was back until we got the call that he’d…that he’d…”
“Dad,” Ethan said quietly. “You don’t have to do this. I’m okay. I’m good. I’m not Uncle George.”
“You need to hear this, son.” The pain in Frank Caldwell’s eyes shocked Ethan. “Your uncle bottled up all his demons and then tried to find solace at the bottom of a vodka bottle. When the vodka stopped working, he turned to other things, and when those things stopped working, he didn’t ask for help. He decided the only way he was gonna have any kind of peace was to leave. And he did. He got into his pickup truck and drove it off a cliff in Malibu. He was only a few years younger than you. Broke our parents’ hearts, and it didn’t take long for them to join him.” His father’s voice was barely above a whisper now, the words heavy with emotion.
“Dad, I’m okay. I’ve never been… I would never.” He’d never been that low. Ethan didn’t know how to say what was in his heart. Hell, up until this moment, he’d never known the circumstances surrounding his uncle’s death.
“I’ve wondered every single day how different things would be if he’d just asked for help. Or better yet, if he’d taken the help when it was offered. He had pals looking out for him. I met them at his funeral. If he had just grabbed hold of that second chance and not let go, things might have been different.” His father turned to him and rested his hand on Ethan’s shoulder. “Maybe we should have pushed more when you started disappearing on us, but we were afraid you’d just hop on your bike and leave, and we’d never see you again. You were so damn angry. And I get it. You lost Rick. You lost a brother. He wasn’t blood, but he was family. But you and Emily are together. You’ve got a baby to think about now, and I…”
He squeezed Ethan’s shoulder. “If you need to talk about anything, I’m here, son. Don’t keep that shit bottled up.” With a pat and a hug, his father stepped back.
“We’re not together,” Ethan said, glancing back at the pond. “Not in the way you think. One night in the summer when we were both feeling real low, things happened, you know? And that’s when…well, that’s when we…” He stumbled over his words.
“I think I know what you’re trying so hard to explain.” Frank smiled, though his brow was furrowed in concentration. “You’re feeling guilt for being with Emily. I think that’s a normal thing to experience. But Rick’s gone, and he’s been gone since the night of that accident. He never came back. And you and Emily, you’re both still here, with a lot of history between the two of you. Folks who know you two, really know you, aren’t surprised. There’s nothing to be guilty about.”
“I told Rick he didn’t deserve her.” Ethan glanced sideways at his father. “The night of the accident. We got into it, and I told him I was going to tell her some things that would change them. Maybe break them up. He left pissed off, and we all know how it ended for Rick. If I had just kept my mouth shut, Rick would still be alive, and Emily would probably still be with him, and she’d be having his kid, not mine.”
“None of us has a crystal ball, son. The only one who’s to blame for that accident is Rick. Not saying he deserved the outcome, but you didn’t hold a gun to his head and tell him to drive down River Road the way he did. That’s on him.”
“Doesn’t make me feel any better.”
“No, I don’t suppose it would.” His dad looked at him. “Do you want to be with Emily? In that way?”
God, this conversation had taken a turn. “We’re having a kid. She’s had too much to deal with on her own. She shouldn’t have to deal with that too.”
“That’s not what I’m saying, Ethan. A sense of duty won’t sustain a marriage.” Ethan balked at that. “That is what we’re talking about, isn’t it? Do you want to marry Emily and give this child a home and a family?”
Marriage? He hadn’t considered that. “I want us to