lake, the love of family surrounding him, all his dreams had come true.
Cosmic justice and all that. It was no surprise that Karma hadn’t smiled down upon me.
Haven was staring out at the lake, the expression on her face sort of sad and sort of thoughtful, but when she turned my way, I saw empathy there too. “I understand that, Travis,” she told me, letting out a soft sigh. “More than you might know.” She paused for a second, her head tilted in consideration. “Maybe the terrible truth about love is that when it’s gone, it leaves a hole in your heart so big it feels like nothing will ever fill it. The idea of risking again feels fatal. A human being can’t possibly lose that much of themselves and still survive. And so you try desperately to fill it with things that never quite do the job. Things that sometimes hurt other people,” she finished softly.
Her words made my heart twist. And I wondered if she was speaking generally . . . or personally. Or maybe a little of both. “You’ve been hurt,” I said. She’d told me a little, but her words made me think there was much more.
But she smiled and waved her hand as if dismissing the gravity she’d obviously heard in my tone. “Of course. Life hurts us all in ways big and small. But as for you, Travis, Archer and Bree have obviously invited you into their lives for a reason. You apologized and your brother forgave you. And however you downplay it, you were a hero that day. Take pride in that.”
I let out a chuckle devoid of humor. “You think too much of me. You don’t know all the details. If you did know . . .” If you did know, you wouldn’t be sitting out here on this porch with me, speaking softly and kindly because you sensed I could use a friend. I suddenly realized that I wanted this woman to know me. But with the realization came fear, because if she truly knew me, if she knew all the things I’d said and done, not as a child, not as a teenager, but as an adult who should have known and done better, she’d turn away in disgust. And why shouldn’t she?
“We’ve all made mistakes, Travis,” she said. “We get to reinvent ourselves. And if the new version is even better, it means we’ve learned and we’ve grown.”
“That easy?”
“No.” She laughed softly. “No, not easy. But . . . but I think it might be worth it.”
I eyed her. “You sound like you know a thing or two about reinventing yourself.”
“I know about trying. And failing. And trying again. That’s mostly what this road trip is about. Reinventing myself. Starting fresh.” She looked troubled, as if she doubted the probability of that happening.
A bird dove down over the water, and swooped upward just as quickly, wings flapping softly in the still nighttime air, a spray of water arcing behind it. The bird’s talons were empty. Whatever he’d spotted under the smooth surface of the water had managed to get away.
“How do you know what to change, and what to hold on to?” I asked. Were there parts of me that were good and valuable, or did I scrap it all and start completely from scratch? And if that was the case, how in the hell did one go about doing that? Especially in a small town where stories became legend, and every buried secret eventually rose to the surface?
If I wanted a fresh start, I’d likely have to change my name and move to Siberia.
Maybe Haven had come to a similar conclusion. Only instead of settling in a deserted arctic tundra, she’d chosen to settle nowhere . . . and everywhere.
There are one of two paths for you. Either lose it all. Or lose it all.
Haven smiled at me. “Well, that’s a deep question and I don’t know if I’ve quite figured that out yet. I guess the answer is different for each of us. Maybe it’s an ongoing process, you know?”
“Yeah,” I said. “I know.” When it came to learning and growing in an emotional sense, I’d seldom been quick on the uptake.
We were both quiet for a moment but it was a comfortable silence, broken only by the soft splashes of the wildlife in the lake, the buzz of insects, and the muffled shout of laughter that found us from the other side of the house.