was too great—but I could have sworn our eyes locked and held for a moment.
And as certain as I was that he’d catch Finley when he tossed her up in the air, I knew he’d secured the board.
But it didn’t make me feel infantilized or undermined.
Oh no, it was worse than that.
It made me feel protected, and that scared the crap out of me. But that little spark of yearning I felt as I watched Jackson and Finley play in the ocean? That was terrifying.
…
“Maybe it makes me a bitch, but I’m kind of glad everyone left yesterday.” Sam handed me a cup of coffee and sat across from me the next day, stretching her legs out in front of her on the sun-warmed deck.
“Thanks,” I said and took a sip. “I am, too. I mean, I’m glad they came, and I’m thankful, but I’ve gotten used to quiet.” Once Sam had moved out, I hadn’t taken another roommate. I’d grown to crave the silent hours I had at home.
“Do you want me to go? I absolutely can,” Sam offered.
“No, please stay. It’s different being around you.” The wind ruffled the spiral notebook pages next to me.
“I can stay longer, too, you know.” She tilted her face at the sun. “If you need someone—I’m here. I don’t start grad school until the fall, and it’s not like Grayson is waiting for me at home in Colorado.”
I flinched. She was two months into his first deployment. Will hadn’t survived his first two weeks. “How are you holding it all together so well?”
She squeezed her eyes shut. “I’m not. I miss him like hell, and there’s not a second that I’m not scared shitless. I guess I just hide it well. Military brat and all that.”
I reached across the distance between us and took her hand. “You’re the strongest woman I know, Sam.”
“Look in the mirror sometime.” She stared at me in that way she had, forcing me to accept her words as truth, but I felt anything but strong. “You’re going to be happy again. Maybe not today, or tomorrow, but one day. You know that, right?”
I didn’t mention Dr. Circe. Her offer was ludicrous…right? But what if it wasn’t? What if there was a real chance that I didn’t have to feel like this for the rest of my life?
But seeing how my luck ran, I was probably one of the 30 percent.
“Maybe I’m one of those people who doesn’t get to be happy. Maybe my chance for happy died with Will.”
“I don’t believe that,” she whispered.
“Happy people never do.”
…
The sun had barely turned the sky pink over the ocean when I woke the next morning. That same sense of dread hit me that I had to get up, had to move through my day, had to pretend. The heaviness of it all was unbearable.
I rolled over on my queen-size mattress and stared at the dark screen of my sleeping laptop. One click, that’s all it would take. One click and I’d see him again, and for those seconds, everything would be all right. My heart lurched, longing for that ten-minute eternity where he was still alive. But I wouldn’t stay for only ten minutes.
All it would take was that first click—the sound of his voice—and I wouldn’t leave this bed all day. Some days I won. Some days I lost. Today was a coin toss, and I needed to call it in the air.
You’re going to be happy again. Sam’s words from yesterday rang in my ears.
But there wasn’t any happiness for me outside the video I’d seen thousands of times. I rubbed my chest, like that would somehow take away the pain, but it never left.
Why wasn’t I okay when everyone else was?
How long could I possibly live like this, fighting with myself over Will’s memory before I even got out of bed?
I know we can lessen some of the pain you’re in.
But Dr. Circe couldn’t. Or could she?
But what would happen if I tried her way and failed? Nothing could possibly feel worse than you do now. And then there was the unthinkable: What would happen if I tried her way and it…worked?
Was there honestly a chance? Probably not. I tried to squash the tiny flame of hope that had flared to life in my chest, but it kept whispering maybe.
I ran my finger along the top of my laptop. Will would have called me all sorts of names for not having the courage to try. He