“Hey, boy, what are you doing here all by yourself?” Harper wondered aloud, seeing Diesel as she came in the front door with bags of groceries hanging from both arms.

She got inside and carefully maneuvered her way to the kitchen as Diesel tried to walk right beneath her feet the way only dogs can do. 

“You must know I have something in one of these bags for you, don’t you?”  She laughed, letting the bags fall onto the counter closest to the refrigerator.  She sifted through a couple of them before she found the dried pig’s ear and made Diesel ‘sit’ and ‘stay’ before she let him have his prize. 

“Such a good boy,” she mumbled, kneeling down to scratch behind his ear as he plopped onto the floor holding the treat between his two front paws and chewed on it relentlessly.

She put away the groceries and noticed the plate of food she’d made earlier for Blue still sat in the microwave uneaten.  That was a first.

Her heart sank just a bit, wondering if he, too, had gone out on a date tonight like Blake had.  It wasn’t like him to do anything but eat straight away after coming in from a long, hard day’s work, but she tried not to think of it.

Instead, she went to pull her clean clothes out of the dryer and headed upstairs to fold them and organize them carefully back into her suitcase. 

The house was quiet.  So quiet that it made her feel more alone than she possibly ever had.  She sat in silence on the edge of her bed and thought about her dinner those few nights ago with her father.  It had been bittersweet seeing him now after Mama had passed, and he had been a little sadder and not quite as hard of the man she had always remembered him as.

Softened by age and a broken heart, she guessed.  It was almost enough to change her mind and not tell him what she had gone there to say in the first place.  That was until he’d looked down his nose at her halfway through dinner and asked what she planned to do to get her husband back.

“I’m not getting him back, Daddy,” she had said calmly, unable to meet his eyes, knowing what argument was sure to follow.

“Have you been faithful?”

Her eyes had widened in shock that her father would even ask such as private question with such implications.

“What?  No, Daddy, I was never unfaithful to John.  But he and I have been divorced for a year and a half now,” she’d reminded him.

He had pursed his lips with disapproval.  “The Lord doesn’t see it that way.”

Angry, she had tightened her fingers around her fork and bounced one knee from the excess energy she held as she remained seated when she’d really wanted to just get up and leave.

She’d pulled in a deep breath and glanced around the room.  It was now or never, she had thought, as she set her fork down on the table.

“There’s something I need to tell you.”

He’d started to interrupt, but she held up a hand, cutting him off.

“Please,” she’d insisted.  “This can’t wait any longer.”

She’d watched his back straighten, clearly perturbed with her, but he kept quiet, so she went on.

“The truth is, I never wanted to marry John, Dad.  I only did it for you because I thought you’d finally be happy with me.  That I could finally do something right.”

Wasn’t hindsight always twenty-twenty? She’d thought.

“That’s absurd, Harper.  Stop spouting this nonsense and finish your dinner.”  Her father had pointed to her plate dismissively with the hand that held his steak knife.  He had then looked down at his own plate as though he thought the conversation had been finished.

Harper wasn’t finished, though.

“No … It’s not absurd, and it’s not nonsense.  I threw away everything I ever wanted just to try to make you happy.”  Her words came out in quiet desperation.  “And it got me nothing but where I am now – alone, with nothing to show for it but a failed marriage and no future.”

She’d watched as her father’s face turned red and his movements became more tight and controlled.  He still chewed a bite of his steak angrily, so she went on while she still had the nerve to do it.

“Did you know I had fallen in love once?  With Blue Brigham … Blake’s brother.”

He seemed disinterested, still poking around his plate when he said, “I know Blue.  He’s a respectable young man.  Runs his daddy’s farm up the road from us.  Hardworking boy.”  He looked up at her and with a shrug had said, “You could’ve done worse.”

He’d set his fork down then, probably now realizing the food would be a deterrent from getting his say in the moment he wanted.

Harper’s mouth gaped open in shock and disbelief.  “Yes, well, he was also eight years younger than me.  You wouldn’t have minded me marrying him when I was twenty-six?  That’s how old I was when I married John.”

Her father had fallen silent again, but the look on his face said his answer had obviously been a resounding ‘hell no.’

“I didn’t think so.  Funny how things look different now, though … You know, I used to look up to you.”  She’d shaken her head.  She was so angry at his words – more angry at his acceptance now of Blue than she would have been if he’d put Blue down instead.  “Now, I feel nothing but resentment for you.  I resent that everything wrong with my life now is because I went against every piece of myself to be the perfect daughter for you, and now, I’m just as bitter and alone as you are.”

“Keep your voice down,” he had said with a scathing glare.  He’d looked around to see if anyone had heard her, even though she hadn’t raised her voice.

She’d gritted her teeth, pulled the napkin from her lap that she then calmly folded and sat on the table in front of her.  She’d pushed her chair back and prepared to stand and leave.  But first, she leaned forward and told her father, “Blue and I had an affair before I married John.  I was pregnant with Blue’s child when John and I walked down the aisle.  When you walked me down the aisle to marry him.  How’s that for your perfect little girl?”

Her eyes bore into his with an unspoken challenge.

“I lost the only child I ever almost had, and here’s the best part of it all.  I … blame … you.”

Her father had gaped, speechless from her admission.  If they’d been anywhere else, she was sure he’d have thundered and rained down hell on her, but as they sat there in the middle of the crowded restaurant, he said no words.

She’d stood up at that point and left her father sitting alone at the table.  She hadn’t even worried she’d left him with the check.  He wouldn’t have let her pay it anyway.

Coming back to the room there in Blue’s house, she heard Diesel come clomping his way up the stairs to find her.  Sweet boy, he must have already finished his chew toy and came up for the company.

She would miss this dog and his loving, playful nature.  She would miss Blake, her optimism and strength, and all her ADHD-scattered-ness.  And yes, she would even miss Blue.  She already missed him, even though she wasn’t even gone yet.  She missed the man he had been, the man he could have been, and the man he was now, all at once. 

She got up from the bed and sat at the writing desk overlooking the darkened prairie beyond the window.  She pulled out her writing journal.  Her chest rose and fell with a sign filled with the sorrow she felt, knowing she was about to leave behind the only love she’d ever really known – Blake as her best friend, her sister of sorts, and Blue.

She flipped open the journal.  She thought for a moment, and then she pressed the pen down to paper, writing just one sentence on the page.  One sentence that said everything she felt in one tidy phrase.

I wish you could have loved me.

Behind her, she heard the sound of a car motor driving up in the driveway and then several car doors slam shut.  Diesel, who had followed her over next to the desk and had curled up against her feet, stood at alert to see what or who was coming. 

They heard the screen door screech open and closed … open and closed … open and closed. 

Three people?

She heard the sound of what she thought was boots clunking onto the floor, but this happened in such a quick succession that it didn’t sound like the unhurried movements she’d grown used to when Blue came in.  He’d never have gotten that far into the house with his boots on, anyway.

She turned in her seat as she heard Blake’s voice.  “Blue, what are you doing?  What’s going on?”

“Maybe we should give him some space.”  This time it was Chase’s muffled voice coming from the floor below.

Hurried footsteps came rushing up the stairs. Then Blue burst into Harper’s bedroom without knocking, with wild eyes and an angry look.

“I’m going to give you one chance, right now, Harper.  One chance to tell me anything you might need to get off your chest that you think I might ought to know.”

Fear and confusion shot through her.  What did he want her to say?  She didn’t know what this was about, but something had apparently happened.

She said nothing.  Just rose from the chair to face him with her hands wringing in front of her.

“Why did you tell Blake about us and our past?” he asked accusingly.

“I …” Harper began, but what could she say?  That she’d had to justify why she needed to leave because she knew he didn’t want her here?

“Why now?” he pressed.  “Did you think it would change anything?”

She shook her head.  “I didn’t really tell her that much, Blue.  Just that I’d had a thing for you a long time ago.  I told her that things hadn’t ended well and that I couldn’t blame you for hating me now, which is why I can’t keep staying here anymore.”

Hesitation played across his face, his eyes still wild and trained on her.  He swallowed and his hands clenched at his sides, as though he warred with himself about something she didn’t understand yet.

He dropped his head down, shoulders slumped, and rubbed his hands over his face.  When he looked back up with her, his face was resolute, like he’d made a decision.

“I know you’ll be pissed, but fuck it.  I don’t care.  I’ve got to say it and I can’t hold it in anymore.”

She watched him, confused, and took a step back to grip the back of the chair to brace herself.

His voice softened just a touch with his next admission. “I know what you wrote about me.  In your journal,” he said, pointing to the notebook on the desk behind her.  “I know I shouldn’t have, and you can’t be mad at me.  I know it was wrong to go through your stuff like that.  But what I saw … about me not being good enough for you, and how you couldn’t stand the sight of me now …”

She was horrified.  The thought of Blue reading her private, most intimate thoughts like that – he knew what a gross breach of privacy this was for her.  Her hands covered her mouth and remained there as he continued.

“And at first, I was mad.  Hell, I was furious.  But then I read that it was your father I wasn’t good enough for, not you.  And as much as I wish that changes anything, it changes nothing, because still now, right up to this very minute, I just gave you the opportunity to get something off your chest that I might need to know, and you still have the nerve to keep it from me.”

“Keep what from you, Blue?  I don’t understand.”  She wracked her brain, poring over what he could have possibly read …

The moment it hit her, she fell back against the desk.  Everything started imploding around her as the worst thing she could have ever imagined was coming true.

Blue stepped toward her, squaring his shoulders, palms opening up to the ceiling.  “When were you going to tell me I have a child?”