Too many years had passed since I did something to try to make someone else feel better. Sure, when Kyle, Adelaide, and Winston came to find me at Beech Lake, I’d agreed to reunite The Avowed. I knew that it was what Kyle had needed; after his struggles with addiction were at bay he wanted to rebuild his life. Who was I to stand in the way of that kind of progress?

But truly kind gestures that weren’t asked of me? It had been a long, long time.

So when Charlotte was standing there crying in the empty gallery, I’d been surprised to feel something in my chest.

Heart attack?

Good grief, what was I coming to that sympathy felt like a catastrophic cardiac event?

No, it was something more subtle than that. I saw the painstakingly arranged fruit tray, crackers, cheeses, and wine, the variety of paintings on the walls, and Charlotte’s stricken face and wanted to stop the pain. I wanted to help, against my better judgment.

I knew that getting close to someone was bad news. After Sarah, I’d seen that. Felt it. Lived it so thoroughly that my every waking hour ached. Charlotte, though, was just a slightly quirky teacher. Ava loved her, so I probably had a burden of gratitude regardless of whether my chest seized up with emotion at the sad sight of Charlotte’s reception.

None of that sympathy explained what I felt when Charlotte kissed me, though.

After Ava had finished her awe-struck tour of the gallery, we had all gone back to the house. Charlotte was drunk and sad, a combination I couldn’t leave alone. It would be too cruel.

Since when did I care about whether I was cruel?

I hadn’t meant the invitation as a proposition, though who knew what Charlotte thought. There had been a spark in those sad eyes of hers when I wiped a tear from her face. I know I’d felt something then, but I’d tried to deny it.

My heart was frozen, put on ice the moment I heard about Sarah’s death. Frozen things couldn’t feel, they just hurt those around them through inaction, through the way they were closed off.

And yet, somehow, the closeness, the deeply felt but quiet sadness of Charlotte’s exhibition got to me. I wanted to help. Me, Jack Sargent. I poured Charlotte water and myself a drink so I could join her, at least in spirit.

I don’t recall what we were talking about, just that after a pause, some silent moment that hovered between us, she leaned in and it happened. Her soft, warm lips were pressed against mine, her face tickling my beard, breath hot and tasting vaguely of red wine.

The jolt from the kiss moved from my lips down to my chest, my stomach. Lower, if I was going to be completely honest.

It was the first time I’d kissed someone since Sarah.

Guilt flooded me moments afterwards, and I leaned back to break the kiss.

That feeling, the shame, the angst, the despair, it was so familiar that I knew precisely how the waves would come to me. First, I’d lash out. It had happened before when I’d tried to drown myself in others’ affections, the brief attempts on the road for our last tour when I thought hooking up would somehow quiet the pain.

Of course, it didn’t.

Just as I was about to say something, probably mean, to Charlotte, she put her face in her hands and groaned.

“I’m sorry, that was really inappropriate,” she said.

Was it, though?

Inside, I was wrestling with the burgeoning desire to pull her back to me and continue the kiss, to feel those soft hands against my skin, to warm myself so that the ice inside wasn’t the only thing I could be. My body yearned to touch her, see her. Inside my mind, though, a raging, inarticulate guilt had consumed all my thoughts.

Sarah was dead. My wife, my love, the person I’d thought I was going to spend forever with. The mother of my beautiful, artistic daughter, Ava. Poor, sweet Ava and I may not have been getting along well, but I deserved that.

What I didn’t deserve was the attention Charlotte was giving me. Nor did the world owe me another chance at love; I knew that much. It was rare to have the kind of relationship Sarah and I had. Why on Earth would I get to try again?

Somewhere inside me, there was a strange new flame, the tiny spark of hope I’d sensed earlier. It was still inside me, battling to gain ground and thrive.

I couldn’t let it.

So I said something I knew I shouldn’t have.

“You’re right, it was,” I said. And I could see the very moment that Charlotte’s heart was crushed. It was as if a light inside her had been turned off, and she stood shortly after.

“I should get out of your hair.”

Her eyes skimmed my beard, my face, and up above me. Even as she was telling herself off, I could see that she wanted me.

It felt so strange, to be desired.

Like I’d failed at erasing myself.

Like somewhere, Sarah was screaming at me.

Infidelity. Pain. Chaos.

Deep down, the hope spat tiny flames into the darkness consuming me. It wasn’t enough.

Maybe nothing ever would be.

Charlotte’s mouth was twisted into a worried, emotional knot, her eyebrows were so furrowed that her forehead looked painful. Normally, rejecting a woman didn’t make me feel so bad.

Not that there was much of a normal to my life these days.

I watched as Charlotte grabbed her purse, swaying slightly as she walked to the door, and left. From the window, I could see a light turn on in her house when she got home. The outline of Charlotte’s body was visible—a silhouette that moved me to keep staring, spark deep inside alight despite my best intentions. She moved slowly, but with a grace that was obvious even from a distance.

I fell asleep a few hours later, turning over in my bed countless times before I was able to get comfortable. Though I told myself it was the rum and coke, I knew that the tension from the evening was a much more likely culprit.

* * *

Ava wanted to see ‘Miss Travers’ to talk more about the exhibition of her paintings the next day, but I wouldn’t allow it.

“Why not?” she said, voice nearing the high-pitched whine of a full-blown tantrum.

“Because you have homework to think about, Ava, and that’s the end of the discussion, ok?”

She huffed and finished her math assignments in a rage, glaring at me whenever she took a moment’s pause.

But I wasn’t ready to face whatever Charlotte had made me feel. Neither the pangs of sympathy nor the incipient desire, carefully held back by years’ worth of guilt.

A few days later, Ava knew I had to relent. It was time for her lesson. I let her go over by herself, pretending to read a book but mostly just letting my eyes skim over the same passage about a dozen times before I gave up. Being a stay-at-home dad was great for some people, but I was losing my mind.

While Ava was at her lesson, I called Stevie.

“Hey man, it’s been way too long,” he said, answering after two rings. I immediately wished I’d kept in better touch since moving back to Minnesota.

“I know,” I said. “Sorry for that.”

“No worries, what’s up?”

What did I even want to talk about?

Everything rushed into my mind at once, chaotic and tumbling.

“How’s life without me in the band?”

Weird question to start with, but I did miss playing. The sound of the bass reverberating through my body while I strummed. My brothers alongside me, totally attuned to each other. That kind of moment, connection, was rare in life, and I didn’t appreciate it while I had it.

“It’s good, I guess. Kyle and Adelaide have been keeping busy with their kiddo, so I’ve been brainstorming what to do next. Don’t think we’ll hire a new bass player to replace you. Doesn’t seem right.”

Though it wasn’t what I’d wanted them to do, wasn’t what I’d suggested the plan be, I was relieved to hear that. A family band with a stranger in it just didn’t work in my head.

“So you think you’ll call it quits?”

“Probably, man. It’s been a great ride, way better than any of imagined.”

“You can say that again.”

“But you know what? I’m turning 32 in a few weeks and I think it’s time I go back to school.”

“No shit!” I said, voice elevated by about an octave from my excitement. Stevie had always wanted to try a degree, but The Avowed’s touring, promotion, and general day-to-day management had been his life since we both dropped out of college at the first sign of success.

“Yeah, yeah, don’t give me grief about it. How’s Ava?”

I paused, and in that silence Stevie heard more than I could have conveyed with words.

“You’ll work it out,” he said. If anyone else had said it to me, it would have stewed inside me, filling me with rage. But Stevie meant well in all things; he was a solid, steady, and calming influence throughout our friendship. “You’re her father.”

“I don’t know anymore, man,” I said. “I kind of think I forfeited that title when I abandoned her.”

“Dude. Stop. You’re going to be her dad from now until the end of your life, whether you think you deserve it or not. That’s kind of how these things work with kids. Yeah, you fucked up. We’ve all done it. But not many people have been through what you have, so young, and tons of dads have been deadbeats who ran away from responsibility. You came back. That’s what’s important.”

“I’m not sure about that,” I said. The words were clipped from the tension in my chest, air pressing out as if I had an anvil on me slowly crushing me to death. Anxiety was a hell of a drug.

“Doesn’t matter if you’re sure, you just have to be there for her. And then keep being there.”

“You make it sound so goddamn simple, Stevie.”

“Yeah it’s a lot easier from the outside,” he laughed.

“Listen, man,” I said. “There’s this neighbor who taught Ava Kindergarten. Ava’s, like, latched onto her. You think I should be worried?”

“Latched on how? Like followed her around town?”

“No, just, she’s a painter, and now Ava wants to be a painter, is taking lessons from her. We went to see her show at a gallery because Ava was so excited about it.”

“That sounds pretty good to me,” said Stevie. But as always, he could hear something beneath my words. Could sense that I wasn’t telling him everything. “Are you worried she won’t remember Sarah?”

That was half of it. Neither of us might, at the rate we were going.

“She was 3 when she died. I don’t think she remembers anything much already.”

It hurt to admit, my sweet little girl unable to recall the laughter we had with my wife. With her family, her mother. And yet I knew that even my adult mind had lost some of the detail around the edges, had forgotten so many days with Sarah that I’d wanted to cling to.

“She’ll remember what you teach her, Jack. There will always be a place in her heart for her mother, even if it’s things you two do together, like traditions or whatever. Visit her grave, talk about what she was like. Do you have any pictures of Sarah?”

“Tons.”

“Make an album. I guarantee it’ll be important to Ava.”

“You’re right,” I said. “I know you’re right.”

Then why did I feel the stubborn dread filling my stomach? I couldn’t force Ava to remember things she couldn’t physically remember. There was only so much any toddler retained.

“And Jack?”

“Yeah?”

“I wouldn’t worry about her old teacher. It sounds like she’s a good role model kind of person, and if she likes Ava and Ava likes her, what’s the problem? So she’s not Sarah, no one ever will be. Let this teacher be her painting instructor, friend, whatever she needs her to be.”

“Stevie, you know I always hate your advice?”

“I know you do, man. You hate that I’m right.”

“Damn straight,” I said. The tone of my voice shifted from cocky, joking, to more serious. “Thank you, though.”

“Anytime. So Jack, I was thinking I might head out to Minneapolis around Christmastime.”

“That’s a great idea, Stevie. We’d love to see you.”

“All right, see ya then buddy.”

“See ya.”

Damnit.

Stevie and I were the same age, but when it came to emotions, he was like a prematurely wise old sage. Or maybe he wasn’t as repressed and angsty as me, whatever. The point was, Stevie got me. He heard my words and the feelings underneath them, and he always knew the right thing to say back. Not necessarily the thing I wanted to hear, but the thing I needed to.

I’d been unfair to Charlotte, I knew that. The rage I felt at the universe for taking Sarah from me wasn’t fair to direct towards another person. Charlotte hadn’t even met Sarah, let alone been part of the crash that killed her. And it wasn’t like she was trying to steal my daughter.

Ava was drawn to her completely on her own accord.

And despite my best intentions, my resolve to remain a single, independent man was shaken by Charlotte. What Stevie had told me about Ava unlocked that longing once more.

I should apologize to Charlotte.

Before I could get over to Charlotte’s house, Ava came in the front door. So much for my excuse that I needed to come pick her up. My resolve weakened without that to prop me up. At least I had a happy daughter on my hands.

“Miss Travers said I have to call her Charlotte now that she’s not my teacher, but I told her that she was still my teacher because she was teaching me how to paint. But she said that that’s different. Do you think it’s different, Dad?”

My heart shuddered into an elevated pulse, staccato and intense.

Ava had called me Dad.

Not Jack.

I smiled at her full of genuine elation. “I think so, Ava, because you’re both painters now, just one of you is a little older and more experienced. It’s not like at school.”

If I mentioned that she’d called me Dad, I would ruin things somehow, I was sure of it. So I kept my excitement to myself, grinning stupidly while I listened to my buoyant daughter describe the colors she used in a painting today. I silently thanked Charlotte for the work she’d already done in supporting Ava.

I definitely needed to apologize to Charlotte.

Bedtime went by quickly that evening, despite Ava’s energy. She happily listened to me reading her a story and then fell asleep shortly after I turned out the lights.

Every fiber of me missed Sarah, wished that she could see the progress we’d been making together. Knowing that I wouldn’t get to tell Sarah about the wonderful night we’d had made me curse the universe all over again, but tonight, there was a much stronger flame of hope burning inside me.

* * *

The next day, once Ava had gone off to school, I checked myself in the mirror. Beard trimmed, hair tamed, eyes… haunted as ever? There might have been a subtle light in them I noticed, but who the fuck knows?

From the window, I glanced over at Charlotte’s house. She was probably home, but I was surprisingly nervous and wanted some sort of confirmation that I wouldn’t ring the doorbell and stand there awkwardly for eons.

No shadows moved behind the curtains, the daylight removing the possibility of silhouettes. I just had to bite the bullet and go over.

It only took about thirty seconds between when I rang the doorbell and when Charlotte answered the door, but it was enough time for my palms to start sweating. I couldn’t recall a time I’d been this unsettled around another person. My guard had been so carefully constructed and reinforced around me over the past few years that the anxiety I was feeling was new.

“Hi Jack,” said Charlotte. The wariness in her eyes made me second guess myself. It seemed arrogant to presume she’d want to talk to me after I’d been rude to her.

“Can I come in?” I asked, trying to smile warmly. It wasn’t easy, given how little practice I’d had in the last while. I probably landed more on ‘psycho killer’ than ‘friendly neighbor.’

She nodded vaguely, standing aside to let me past her into the hallway. There was a rich smell of coffee permeating the house, one that drew me into the living room further. Charlotte had a blank canvas set on the couch near her empty easel, and there were groups of jars full of paint water on the kitchen counter. It was chaotic, but felt like a home: warm, inviting, creative.

“Coffee?” she asked, pre-emptively grabbing for a mug. When I said yes, she kept moving, preparing the drink for me busily. I wondered if she was avoiding having to look me in the eye.

“So, listen…I’ve been meaning to apologize to you,” I said. Charlotte’s back was still turned to me while she poured the coffee, but I couldn’t wait any longer. Plus, if she was nervous I didn’t want to make her stew in the anticipation. The downside to this approach was that I couldn’t see how she reacted, if she did at all.

From where I sat on the couch, Charlotte’s back looked no different. When she turned to me, mug of coffee in hand, her face told another story. Her mouth was tight, lips pressed together as she fought some unspoken emotion.

“Really, I was a jerk,” I said. “The thing is, my wife died in a car crash a few years ago and I’ve never been the same.”

There it was, out loud.

Words were mundane, small. And yet in that one sentence I conveyed so much about my life: the agony of the past years, the shrieking fear that I would never recover from the grief, the pain, the guilt. I hoped Charlotte understood the gravity of what I had just told her.

“That’s horrible,” she said, her voice quiet and breathy. “I’m so sorry. I suppose that’s why Ava was in foster care?”

“Almost,” I said. “Well, basically.”

How to sum it up?

“I haven’t been the father I should have been,” I added. “And I know I’m still being prickly as fuck to everyone around me, including you.”

Her eyes looked impossibly deep, like pools I could escape into forever, never to see the light of day again. I craved that escape and found myself staring, unbidden, at Charlotte.