I have no idea what time it is when I wake up, but I’m pretty sure it’s much earlier than I want it to be. The light that filters in through the blinds is dim, so either it’s barely dawn or the sky outside is dark with clouds.
That’s the first thing I notice.
The second is that my mouth feels dry, my throat scratchy, and my head is pounding. Guess after a horrible evening and restless night, it was too much to hope that I wouldn’t wake up feeling like crap.
The third thing I become aware of is Jay, lying next to me.
Sprawled on his stomach, he’s facing away from me, arms buried under his bunched-up pillow. He’s wearing a white T-shirt, his hair is rumpled, and he’s breathing the steady, shallow breaths of deep sleep.
It’s both weird and wonderful to wake up next to him like this. When I got into bed last night after brushing my teeth and while waiting for him to do the same, I wasn’t sure he would. But not only did he, as soon as he crawled under the blankets, he wrapped his arms around me again. And that’s how I fell asleep. With Jay holding me.
I don’t even want to think about how I would’ve gotten through the past twelve hours without him. The way he was there for me and how much closer it brought us proves how wrong he was that sex would ruin our relationship. If anything, I’m stronger now—stronger and happier. He probably is, too. I can’t be alone in feeling that way, right?
Grandma.
It still feels so surreal. Memories of last night are fuzzy and hazy, like a dream. It’s as if the part of my brain that knows it’s true and real and unalterable is hidden behind a door, and I know it’s there, but if I open the door, it’s all going to come rushing out at me, submerge me and drown me. So I’m keeping the door shut. Until I’m ready to open it.
Scooting down to the foot of the bed, I manage to slip out of it and get up without waking Jay. With rocks in my stomach and my limbs leaden and sluggish, I shrug into the first clothes I can find in my luggage: black leggings and a thin, thigh-length, wine-red top. Then I unzip the top pocket of the suitcase and grab the pink and sparkly gift-wrapped package I put in there while packing in a rush before going to Angie’s party Thursday night. Was that really less than three days ago? It feels like an eternity.
Glancing back, I see that Jay doesn’t even stir at the squeak of the bedroom door opening.
The house is silent, which makes the slight creaking of the stairs sound all the louder as I descend. I go straight to the kitchen, where I fill myself a glass of water before digging into the cabinet where Mom keeps her stash of over-the-counter meds. Finding an oversize bottle of generic painkiller, I toss down a double dosage, and then I turn on the single-cup coffee and espresso maker. With a long and tiring day ahead, I need to attack this headache on two fronts.
The water tank is empty, and I’m at the sink in the middle of filling my cup with water when movement catches my eye through the kitchen window. Someone’s in the gazebo, and when I bend over the sink and crane my neck for a better look, I recognize the black robe with its printed pattern of pink-and-purple roses immediately. It’s Grandma.
I pour the water into the coffeemaker and hit the button for it to start brewing. When I pulled my shit back together last night after crying in Jay’s arms on the bedroom floor, we went back downstairs. First thing I did was find my grandmother and give her a hug. I didn’t say anything—I couldn’t; what had happened was so big and incomprehensible, and all the words that came to mind were too small—and neither did she.
I helped with the rest of cleanup after dinner, and then Jay and I went to bed. After which I lay there for a long time, wondering if I should’ve just forced myself to talk to her after all. And imagining a dozen different ways that conversation might’ve played out. So right now I’m pretty grateful to have found Grandma alone and to have a second chance at not leaving this house with that regret hanging over me.
When my coffee is done, I pour a dash of milk into it, and then I head to the patio door with the steaming mug in my hand and the gift tucked under my arm.
The grass rustles as I cross it, and the brick steps up the small slope to the white, wooden gazebo feel cold and hard under my bare feet. Hands folded in her lap, Grandma sits in the wicker love seat with its rust-colored pillows. Her face lights up when she catches sight of me.
“Morning, honey,” she says as I draw near.
“Hey. You want some coffee?” I hold out my mug to her, ready to pop back in the house and make myself another cup if I need to.
“No, thank you,” Grandma replies with a shake of her head. She pats the cushion beside her.
I accept the invitation without a word, taking a seat next to her. Tucking my feet up on the seat and crossing my arms, I hug myself against the brisk morning air. It’s damp and chilly out here, and the grass glistens with raindrops that apparently fell during the night.
“I got you a little birthday present.” Picking the gift off my lap, I offer it to my grandmother. “I know I wasn’t supposed to, and I didn’t know if I’d get a chance to give it to you in private, so I was just going to leave it in your room this morning. Didn’t want anyone yelling at me for it. But now I don’t care anymore.”
Eyeing me sideways with her brows arched, Grandma accepts the thin, rectangular package.
“I donated money, too,” I reassure her hastily.
“Okay,” she says, sounding amused, and with her age-spotted but still dexterous hands, she starts to tear off the paper.
I lift the mug up to my lips, tentatively testing the temperature before taking a slurping sip.
“Oh, my…” Grandma has pushed away the wrapping paper, unfolded the protective tissue paper, and flipped over the picture frame to reveal the painting made from the photo of us that’s on my fridge. The artist did a good job, and I’m very happy with the result.
“I know you’ve said it’s your favorite picture of us,” I explain, watching her run her thumb down the edge of the embellished silver frame while gazing at the image behind the glass. “There are artists you can hire through the Internet to do paintings out of photographs. I thought you might like it.”
“Well, you thought right.” She puts a hand on my arm, squeezing it through my sweatshirt. “Thank you, honey. It’s beautiful.”
After one last, admiring look at the painting, she re-wraps it in the tissue paper and tucks it in between her hip and the armrest. Almost offhandedly, she says, “I’ll make sure it’ll be yours when I’m gone.”
A lightning bolt of pain strikes my gut. The door hiding the ugly truth starts to inch open. Tightening my grip on my mug, I say in a strangled whisper, “Please, don’t talk like that, Grandma.”
She throws me an impatient look. “It’s never a bad time to be practical about things that need to be done. Anyway, I’m going to give you my lily brooch, too. Next time I see you.”
I stare at her, my eyes stinging and blurring. In my hands, my coffee is quickly cooling. Behind the gazebo, in the trees by the wooden fence, birds are chirping and tweeting, singing songs that to human ears sound merry and pretty. When in fact it’s mostly male birds who are trying to get laid. And I guess that works for them, or they wouldn’t do it, right? I mean, millions of years of evolution, slowly morphing from dinosaur to bird, and you’d think if all that noise didn’t make the girl birds come flapping over to get some, the males would’ve figured out a different strategy by now?
Fighting the lump that’s growing big and hard and aching in my throat, I say, “I’m just not ready. This wasn’t supposed to happen for a long time.”
With a small snort, my grandma shoves her hands into the pockets of her robe. “I beat average life expectancy. That’s pretty good.”
“Stop it.” I’ve gone past pleading now. At least with this spark of anger, it’s easier to suppress the tears.
Grandma heaves a sigh and flashes a contrite smile. “I’m being unfair, aren’t I? I’ve had weeks to come to terms with it. You’ve only had one night.”
I give a short nod of agreement before taking another drink of my now-lukewarm coffee, swallowing it with difficulty.
“And it’s always harder for those who are left behind, isn’t it?” she muses. “I should know.”
Biting the inside of my cheek, I keep quiet and let her talk.
“Eighteen years without your grandfather. They were supposed to be our best years. Retirement, travel, great grandchildren. Just enjoying life. And I had to do it all without him.”
Her gaze meets mine then, soft and watery. Quietly, she says, “I’m ready to be with him again, Mia.”
Something twists and clenches inside my chest. “Do you really believe that’ll happen?”
“I do,” she replies firmly. Then her chin wobbles. “The only thing I regret is not getting to meet more of my great-grandchildren. Like Paige and Logan’s little boy. And you and Cameron and your cousins will have kids someday, too, I’m sure.”
I swallow hard. Try to imagine all of that happening, life going on, without Grandma. But I can’t do it. The idea that she’ll just be…gone. It’s incomprehensible.
She reaches out to pat my arm. “You have the rest of your family, sweetheart. It’s a pretty great family, isn’t it?”
Yeah. I give a nod, because I suppose it is.
“And you have that handsome young doctor of yours.” A devil sparks in Grandma’s eyes, and she shoots me a smug and almost dreamy smirk.
My heart stumbles and hiccups. How do I respond? How much does she know, and what does she suspect? If she’s having visions of me in a white dress and more adorable and boisterous great-grandchildren, and if that image makes her happy, it’d be pretty selfish of me to dash those hopes.
And really, that’ll happen someday, won’t it? Maybe. Maybe not.
I open my mouth to give her a politely evasive reply, but she holds up her hand and cuts me off. “No, don’t say anything about that. I don’t care what’s going on between you two.”
Well, okay then. I press my lips together.
Sliding closer, she puts her arm across my shoulders. And then she leans in until her forehead touches mine. In low tones, she says, “I just want you to be happy, Mia mine. He seems to make you happy.”
And that I really don’t know how to respond to. Ignoring the tightness in my chest, I decide to change the topic. “I’m coming back next weekend. And the one after that. And every weekend, until—”
I can’t finish that sentence.
My grandmother draws her head back to squint at me. “Won’t that be really expensive?”
I shake my head. “I can afford it. Please, don’t worry.”
“Hmph. Well, I’m selfish, and I want to see you, so I won’t argue.” She pulls me back toward her, and I go willingly, resting my head on her shoulder.
“We get to say good-bye at least,” she murmurs against my hair. “That’s something.”
Yeah. That’s definitely something.
We’ve been on the road for all of twenty minutes when the prospect of taking the 5 back through the monotonous Central Valley grows intolerable, and I suggest we take the Pacific Coast Highway instead. Jay hesitates, pointing out that it’ll add at least two hours to the trip. I tell him I don’t care, and he doesn’t argue, though I can tell he’s not exactly thrilled with the idea.
He’s probably just being nice because of what happened last night, but I’m not above exploiting that. So instead of heading inland toward the 5, I keep driving south, where the freeway curves westward and eventually connects with the PCH, which takes us through Monterey and Carmel.
Saying good-bye to everyone this morning was a somber affair, but somehow I managed to keep my cool. I didn’t even break down when I hugged Grandma and again promised to come back next weekend. Still, not even when I first went to college was it as hard to leave as today.
Somehow Jay and I manage to keep the conversation limited to mundane topics. He hasn’t said a word about my grandmother or about how he held me all night. It’s like he senses that if I want to talk about it, I will. He doesn’t push, but he also doesn’t back away. He’s there if I need him, and the rest of the time, he gives me space. He knows me that well.
When he’s quiet, though, his silence feels heavy and grim, and my vague feeling that something is weighing on his mind grows and nags at me. Not that Jay is usually chatty, but this feels different. He’s in a dark mood, and I don’t know why. I want to ask, but I need to work up the courage first. Just in case it’s something I’m not equipped to handle today, my defenses having taken a serious beating last night.
Once we leave the populated areas behind and have only miles and miles of wilderness ahead, I pull into the first turnout I catch sight of to hit the switch between the visors that opens the convertible top. And then I drive on, breezing down the curvy road with the cool and fresh air blasting our faces, wisps of my hair whipping around my face, and my ponytail dancing behind me. To our right, the ocean stretches out to the horizon, and to the left, nothing but green hills as far as my eyes can see.
I fell in love with the Pacific Coast Highway when I was twelve and my parents took me and my siblings on what they dubbed their “Great California Road Trip Vacation.” The gorgeous coastal highway with its winding road, lush vegetation, and sheer sea cliffs ended up being my favorite part of the trip. I try to drive it whenever I can because it beats the hell out of taking the 5.
“Where are we stopping?” Jay has to raise his voice above the whooshing of the open air.
“There’s this nice beach not that far from here with pretty easy access. I had a picnic lunch there when I took this trip with Ma—” I stop myself. Because it seems somehow inappropriate to finish the sentence, especially since I’m so unsure of where Jay’s mind is at right now.
His sunglasses hide his eyes, but his flattened lips reveal his reaction. “You want to stop and eat in the same place where you had a romantic picnic with your ex-boyfriend?”
“There aren’t that many options out here, Jay.” I’m trying not to sound defensive, because I’m telling the truth. But I’ve started feeling like every time I mention Matt, I’m providing evidence for Jay’s accusation that I’m not over my ex. Which is ridiculous and dumb and—
I mean, I have a lot of memories from the year and a half when Matt was pretty much my entire life. Most of them are good memories. Just because he turned out to be a cheating dipshit doesn’t mean the memories got erased.
And I don’t understand why that means I’m not over him. It doesn’t. Period.
Jay has no response, and we drive in silence until I recognize the turnout I’m looking for. After parking and turning off the engine, I grab the lunch bags from the backseat, lock the car, and we start strolling down toward the beach. Farther south, fine sheets of fog drape the bluffs jutting out to sea, and as we tread carefully on the dirt path that winds down the steep slope, I can smell it as the salty air begins to blend with the earthy and fragrant shrubs that line the trail.
Once we reach the beach, where the sand is rough and pebbly, we find a large rock that we can sit on. My mom pulled me aside as we were leaving this morning to hand me a pair of brown paper bags, saying she’d packed us lunch so we wouldn’t stop and eat fast food. Which was such a Mom Thing to do, and I’m pretty sure with her empty nest, she misses doing Mom Things, so I thanked her and hugged her and told her I’d see her next weekend.
The meal she prepared is sandwiches with a side of apples and bottles of juice that’s organic and non-GMO, has no added sugar and no high-fructose corn syrup, is ethically sourced…and is probably also the nectar that gives unicorns their magical powers.
We don’t talk while we eat, the only sound that of the waves rolling and crashing on the beach. The sun glints on the water, and a flock of seagulls is soaring and flapping their wings above the surf.
“Did you already work the shifts you switched with Yamada or are you doing that when we get back?” I ask when I can stand the quiet no longer.
“When I get back.” Jay has finished eating and is tossing his trash and scraps back into his brown bag, scrunching the crinkly paper as he closes it back up. “I’m working the next five days.”
His glum tone gets under my skin, and I want to make it go away. “So you’ve got a five-day workweek like a normal person then?” I say lightly, teasing.
He scoffs, and I’m sure that if his sunglasses didn’t obscure his eyes, I’d see him rolling them. “Uh-huh.”
A sigh rises in my chest, heaviness settling on my shoulders. Enough. The thought of sitting next to a grumpy Jay for the too-many hours of driving we have left is too depressing, and I need to try and fix it before we get back on the road.
Still, I’m dreading the unknown cause for his bad mood enough that I can’t just jump right in. So I take the last bite of my apple, chewing the tart and juicy fruit while I’m girding myself. Whatever’s got him down can’t be bad enough to warrant this level of apprehension on my part…right?
After swallowing the last bit of food, I drop the apple core into my lunch bag. “Okay,” I say briskly. “You’ve been in a shitty mood all morning. What’s wrong?”
For a few seconds, his face stays turned toward me, and then he looks away. His jaw flexes, and his Adam’s apple bobs as he swallows.
What he doesn’t do is say I’m mistaken, that there’s nothing amiss. And that is enough to set off alarm bells in my head.
“Jay?” I prod, my heart in my throat.
With pursed lips, he blows out a loud and long breath. Then he says, “There’s some stuff I haven’t told you.”
Oh-kay. My pulse kicks up a notch. “Bad stuff?”
“Yeah, but not in the way you think, probably.” Avoiding my gaze, he bends down and picks up a small rock and tosses it toward the water. He throws it far, like he put all his strength into it, and it seems aggressive, almost angry.
With foreboding rushing in my veins, I wait for him to continue.
“You’ve probably noticed I never really talk about my family or my childhood,” he says at last.
A huff of disbelief escapes me. Because that’s definitely an understatement.
He pinches the bridge of his nose. “I never told you that when I was eighteen, I changed my last name to Bradshaw. From Miller. That was my name as a kid. Jay Miller.”
“What? Why?” I frown at him. What the hell is he talking about?
A few seconds of tight-lipped silence pass before he replies, “Mostly because of my dad. I didn’t want to share that fucker’s name anymore.”
Wow. Okay, so yeah, of course there’s a reason he’s never shared anything about his family, and I knew it couldn’t be pretty. But his vehemence is still a bit of a shock. “And why is that?”
So then he draws a deep breath, and while we’re sitting there on the quiet and empty beach with the sun beating down on us from high in the sky, he tells me. He tells me about growing up with his neglectful mom and his drug-addicted and rarely present dad.
And as I’m listening to this, my spine stiffens and my stomach starts burning with fury. He’s describing two people who should’ve never had a child and who apparently, for the most part, carried on with their lives as if they hadn’t. As if their little boy was an afterthought, a nuisance, instead of someone they should’ve put all their energy into caring for, raising, and loving.
It’s not that hard to just love your kid and do what’s right for him. What kind of fucked-up people can’t even manage that much? A lump swells in my throat, and I’m wishing I could go back in time, find him, give him a hug, and take him away from that life.
“When I was thirteen,” Jay says, his tone flat, “my dad was working construction near Dallas, and he made friends with another guy on the crew, Arturo Mendes. The cops claimed the two of them had broken into at least three other houses over the course of a couple of months, stealing stuff for drug money. Then they screwed up, broke into a house by mistake where the family was home.”
My heart starts hammering in my chest. I know I don’t want to hear what’s coming next.
Jay’s lips curl. “Shit hit the fan. My dad and Mendes both had guns, and they ended up killing the mom and the two kids. Shot them all in the head. The dad, too, but he survived.”
“Oh, my God.” I clap my hand over my mouth, a hand that’s trembling while I’m heaving for breath. Jay’s dad is a murderer?
“He was convicted of three counts of murder,” Jay goes on in a voice that’s still eerily emotionless. “Along with some other, more minor charges.”
“Shit,” I whisper through the fingers pressed against my lips. This is insane. Jay’s dad is a murderer.
I’m sitting there, my breathing rapid and loud in my own ears. He’s leaving out a lot of details, I can tell, and I appreciate that, because the last thing I want is to picture the scene he’s just described. But that doesn’t stop my imagination from playing a gruesome mental slideshow. A wave of nausea rolls over me.
That poor family. That poor man, losing his wife and kids to something so ugly and senseless and unbelievably fucked up, and having to live with that for the rest of his life.
But they weren’t the only victims, were they? For six years I’ve had no clue that Jay was carrying something like this around with him.
“That’s so messed up.” My throat closes up again, and I clear it, swallowing hard. “I’m sorry.”
Inching closer to him on the rock so that my arm brushes up against him, I reach down and try to nudge my hand into his. He widens his palm and allows it, wrapping his large and warm hand around mine.
With his face turned toward the vast Pacific, the waves crashing on the beach just a few feet away, Jay says nothing, only tightens his hold on me.
“So he’s serving a life sentence then?” I ask, hesitating because I feel like there’s more. More that I’d rather not know about.
Except, no, that’s not right. It’s stuff I wish weren’t true. There’s a difference.
“Nope. Mendes rolled on him, cut a deal, and got life without parole.” Jay’s voice goes so quiet and hoarse I can barely hear him. “And my dad got the death penalty. He’s been on death row for the past twelve years.”
Oh, my God. My grip on his hand tightens involuntarily.
Jay’s dad is a murderer. Who’s been sentenced to die.
It’s fucking surreal.
“His execution is in three weeks,” Jay goes on, giving a small cough, clearing moisture out of his throat. “On July tenth. That’s why my uncle Warren is visiting. He’s stopping in Texas to see my dad, and then he’s coming here to spend the day with me.”
In three weeks?
There’s a sharp, slicing pain in my chest, like my heart is literally breaking for them.
“Is there any chance he’ll get a stay?” I ask softly, knowing my voice will crack if I put more force into it.
“I don’t know,” he says with a shake of his head. “I don’t care.”
A scoff of protest rises in my chest, and it comes out gently but insistent. Because I don’t believe him.
He looks at me with his eyebrows lowered, his nostrils flaring. “I really don’t, all right? This isn’t news to me. I’ve had twelve years to think about it. And he’s just not worth it.”
“But…he’s your dad,” I point out. “You have some good memories of him, don’t you?”
“Sure,” he snaps. “That doesn’t mean I’m going to lose any sleep over him now, though. I refuse to give him that much power over me. He’s fucked me up enough already. I’m not going to allow him to do that to me anymore. I let him go. As far as I’m concerned, he’s already dead.”
I wince, a jolt going through me. He sounds like a stranger right now. This hard, angry, and unforgiving man is not my Jay. Yeah, this stuff is all news to me, but that doesn’t mean he’s a different person than I thought he was. Doesn’t mean that I’ve spent six years not truly knowing my best friend. This isn’t him. I don’t believe it.
And if he really believes what he’s saying, then he’s lying to himself.
I replay his words in my head, frowning when I realize what he said. “How did he fuck you up?”
Jay doesn’t answer right away. His jaw flexing, he stares at me, and underneath the dark cover of his sunglasses his eyes look black and bottomless. My heart beats a little faster with each second as his silence stretches and thickens, growing like a tidal wave. I’m sitting there frozen in the face of it.
When he speaks, he does it in a low and tightly controlled tone. “My mom lied to me and said he was in prison for burglary. I was fifteen when I found out the truth, and…it fucked with my head. It was bad enough that I never got to see him anymore. Finding out that he was a murderer—” Jay grinds out a low, disgusted grunt. “I didn’t know how to deal with it. And my mom didn’t even try to help.”
My tongue feeling like sandpaper, I ask, “And?”
He flattens his lips so much they disappear and lose color. “I started hanging out with the wrong people,” he admits, sounding reluctant and pained. “These two guys who were a year older than me. One of them had a big brother who everyone knew was an Eighty-Eight. A gang member. And there were rumors my friends had been recruited, too, and I knew that. And I didn’t care.”
Holy shit. Gang members? The world he’s describing is entirely foreign to me, and I can’t quite wrap my head around it not being foreign to Jay, too.
“What’d you do?” I say cautiously.
“A lot of stupid shit.” He sighs, the corners of his mouth turned down. “Kept a lookout for cops when my buddy’s older brother was dealing meth. Waited in the car for him a lot while he was off doing God knows what. One time I was even the driver when he came running back to the car, yelling at me to go, go, go. So I guess whatever he did that night…I was the getaway driver.”
My jaw drops. I’ve got enough attorneys in the family to know that the perpetrator and his getaway driver are equally culpable in the eyes of the law. Jay could’ve gotten in some serious trouble for that.
“Then Sean—the big brother—was shot by a member of a rival gang,” Jay supplies. “And then it was all-out war. A lot of retaliation. It was bloody and brutal. My buddies and I mostly stayed out of it, thank God. We were there when he got shot, though. It was a drive-by shooting. I was standing about ten feet away from him.”
I’m shaking my head, my mind going numb. Pulling my hand out of his, I lift it up to slowly rub his upper arm. Because I don’t know what else to do. “Then what happened?”
“We got caught.” He looks at me then, flashing a bitter smile. “Out of everything we did, we got caught while we were breaking into school to vandalize and steal stuff from the lockers of a few members of the other gang. There was a janitor still in the building who called the cops. So I guess, on the whole, we were lucky, because we definitely could’ve gotten caught for something much worse.”
“Getting arrested is not a joke.” Thoughtfully, I echo his words back at him, because now they make sense.
He agrees with a grunt. “My buddies both had priors and ended up serving time. I got probation, community service, and court-ordered counseling.”
“Jay…” I don’t know what else to say, so I just wrap my arms around his chest and lean my head on his shoulder. He feels the same. Smells the same. Sounds the same. But he’s not the same.
He reaches up, touches my arm as he says, “So I guess that was part of the reason I changed my name. And then when I was twenty-one, I was able to get my record sealed.”
I squeeze him more tightly against myself. “I would never have guessed there was anything like this in your past.”
He doesn’t respond, and for a while, it seems like he’s not going to say anything else.
But then he heaves a sigh, and the next words pour out of him. “When I got arrested, my mom called Uncle Warren, which was probably the best and most responsible thing she ever did as a parent. He dropped everything and took a leave of absence so he could come home. He helped straighten me out. Took me with him to Africa the next summer, and I came back knowing what I wanted to do with my life.”
His voice subdued, he adds, “I don’t know where I’d be without him. In prison, probably.”
“I’d love to meet him someday,” I say, and I mean it, because clearly without his uncle, I wouldn’t have Jay in my life. I’d like the opportunity to thank the man.
We sit there like that for a while. I can feel his heart beating under my arm while I replay in my mind everything he just told me—weighing it, chewing on it, trying to grasp it all. It’s like I can see Jay so much more clearly all of a sudden, have a better understanding of what makes him tick.
The way he’s such a stickler for following rules, how cautious he is, and how he never does anything before considering the consequences… It’s because he came so close to ruining his life. He got a second chance, and he’s doing whatever it takes not to screw it up.
Jay.
“I’m so sorry,” I tell him, tilting my head back and reaching up to put my hand on his cheek, urging his face toward me. “For all of it. I wish you would’ve told me sooner.”
He bends down so that his forehead touches mine, and I can feel some of the tension leave his body.
It should be a peaceful moment. A short space of time where we’re sitting quietly on a beach together, and he’s finally gotten all of this off his chest, and the world didn’t end.
But there’s something teasing at the back of my mind, something I’ve overlooked, something important. The thought is there, fuzzy and ominous, but I can’t bring it into focus—until suddenly it’s there, sharp and simple.
“Why are you telling me?” I look up at him, letting my hand fall away from his cheek. “Why now?”
He hesitates. Clears his throat. Then he sounds grudging as he replies, “I wanted you to find out from me instead of your parents.”
“They know?” I pull back all the way, letting go of him as I watch him with eyebrows raised.
Hastily, he says that’s what he and my dad talked about yesterday. He explains about my mom considering running for a judgeship—which she’s been talking about for years, so the only surprising part is that she’s finally doing something about it—and the investigator they hired, who dug up Jay’s past.
Briefly, I’m too stunned to speak. Then I shake my head, disgust coiling through me. “But why did my dad even bring that up with you? It’s none of his business.”
Jay’s shoulders heave in a shrug. “I don’t know. He was just being a dad? Looking out for you? I definitely got the feeling he thought you should know.”
I’m rolling my eyes and pressing my lips together. My dad’s motives are rarely that one-dimensional.
“So…wait,” I say as another thought occurs to me, a logical progression of the previous one. “You’re only telling me now because Mom and Dad found out?”
Jay goes completely still, muscles flexing at his jaw like he’s clenching his teeth.
Pressure builds in my chest, bubbling up into my head. I’m hearing myself like I’m outside of my body as I slowly and tersely ask, “You were never going to say anything to me, were you?”
“Probably not,” is his abrupt answer after a short pause.
I clench my hands into fists. “Why?”
He releases a burst of humorless laughter. “Because I’m ashamed and embarrassed?”
His plain confession sinks into me. The crisp, briny air with its smell of seaweed grows thick and soupy, and I can’t find the words to describe what I’m feeling.
“Why would I want you to know about it?” he goes on testily. “It has nothing to do with me anymore, so how would any good come out of telling you?”
A scoff wrenches itself from my throat. “It has everything to do with you now, Jay. It made you who you are.”
He stares at me then, and it occurs to me that having this conversation with sunglasses on is like driving blind. I want to know what his eyes are revealing right now.
“I couldn’t stand the thought that you might see me differently,” he says—somberly, unhappily. “That you might be disgusted and lose respect for me. Your opinion matters to me.”
I’m gaping at him, my head giving a small jerk.
Is he saying what I think he’s saying right now?
“You actually thought I’d judge you for what your dad did and how you reacted to that when you were still just a kid?” My voice rises higher with each syllable, my breaths coming out fast and shallow. “That’s so fucking insulting. I can’t believe you think I’m capable of that. Is that seriously how you see me?”
“It’s not about you, Mia,” he fires back, scowling. “It’s about me and my…irrational fears.”
“No.” The objection comes out of my mouth like a whiplash. “That’s such bullshit. It’s been six years. If you really wanted to share this with me, then there must have been at least one moment in the past six fucking years when you could’ve overcome that fear.”
For the space of one, two, three breaths, all we do is stare at each other.
“I’m sorry.” Shaking his head, he throws his hands out—a gesture that indicates surrender but actually just means he wants me to shut up now. “All right?”
“It’s not all right,” I say coldly. “None of this is all right.”
I push up and away from the rock, and sand seeps into my flip-flops as I take a small step. In jerky and angry motions, I bend down and snatch the crumpled lunch bags from the ground.
“We should get going again,” I tell him, and I don’t wait for his response before I start stomping across the sand toward the dirt path that’ll take me back up to my car.
Goddamn him and his secrets and his not trusting me with them without being forced to.