Chapter 29

Elle

Elle waited at the diner until long after everyone else had left. Kelly and Grace wanted to stay with her, but she’d insisted they leave. They were exhausted from the day’s work and needed to get some sleep. Plus, Kelly really had to get home to her kid brother and spend some time with him. He was pretty independent for his age but he still needed his sister. Elle couldn’t bring herself to leave, though. She was certain Forrester hadn’t abandoned her, and she was going to stick around and give him more time. Whatever had come up, she knew he had a reason for not showing.

She sat at the counter and sipped coffee until long past midnight. Every time a car drove by on the street she jumped to see if it was him. It never was. At about two in the morning, she started to doze off. When she realized she was falling asleep, she decided to call it a night.

She hadn’t cried since her pity fest with Grace and Kelly, and even though she was on the verge of tears now, she refused to cry again.

What did she have to cry about?

He was coming back for her. She knew he was.

She changed her shoes and put on the snow boots Kelly had lent her and her coat. Then she opened the door and let the freezing air rush in around her. It felt good. She stepped out into the parking lot. There was a slight gust blowing. She turned and looked up the street. She could see some headlights in the distance. She waited for the vehicle as it approached.

Then she saw that it was a pickup truck. As it got closer, she felt her heart begin to soar in relief and happiness, but at the last minute, it turned at the intersection and she saw that it wasn’t Forrester.

She shook her head but didn’t cry. She thought about what she’d seen earlier in the day. Forrester’s truck had been right there, parked outside, and then it was gone.

She looked at the spot where he’d been parked and something caught her eye. It was difficult to see, white on white, stuck in the snow, but as it rustled in the breeze she saw that it was a crumpled up piece of paper. For some reason, she imagined Forrester had left it there. She rushed over it it, half covered in snow, and clenched it in her hand like a treasure.

It was wet and smudged, but she opened it carefully and could still make out the words. She read it in the red-tinged light of the diner’s closed sign. She read every word, and then, when she was finished, read it all again, as if it contained the secret answers to deep questions she’d been searching for her entire life.

* * *

Forrester Snow,

The very sound of your name still makes my stomach turn. You’re scum, boy. You’re a no good, piece of shit, son of a bitch. You killed your mother, you know.

People say you’re not to blame. You didn’t know what you were doing. You were just a baby.

I say, all that’s fine. You were a baby. You didn’t ask to be born. But you still killed her, and for that I’ll always hate you. You’re no more guiltless than the bullet that strikes its mark. The bullet doesn’t know what it’s doing, but it kills its target all the same.

That’s you, Forrester Snow. You killed your own mother, you killed my wife, and I curse the day you were conceived. If I could go back and not fuck your mother the day I made her pregnant, I’d do it. I’d erase your very existence.

I was never the perfect husband, but I loved that woman more than I could ever love you.

You’re worthless to me. You would have been worthless to her too, if she’d survived your birth. No one could love you when you were born. The truth is, I didn’t want to raise you. I tried to give you up to the county, I tried to get rid of you, but they wouldn’t take you. No one wanted you.

You were truly born alone, Forrester. You were born alone, and mark my words, you will die alone. The words of a dying man must be worth something. The curse of a dying man must be worth something.

So hear this, for this is my curse. No one will ever love you, you little piece of shit. You will destroy anyone you ever try to love. You will find no happiness, and you will give no happiness. If you ever think you’ve found the girl who’s won your heart, you run. You run away from her as far and as fast as you can.

Because if you don’t, you’ll destroy her, just like you destroyed your own mother.

Curse you

Abraham Snow

* * *

It was then that she cried. She wasn’t crying for herself, but for Forrester, and for what the letter meant. She knew all too well what a letter like that could do to a man’s heart. Even someone with the best of intentions might not be able to think or act correctly after receiving something like that from a parent. She knew she wouldn’t have been able to bear it.

Was this the reason Forrester had run out?

If it was, she’d forgive him. She wouldn’t forget him, she wouldn’t ever forget what they’d done together, but she wouldn’t hate him. He’d done what he had to do. If that meant heartbreak for her, so be it.

As the tears ran down her cheeks, she knew what had happened. Forrester was broken. He’d been broken by his own father.

Who could possibly commit to a girl, a girl he’d asked to bear him a son, after reading a letter like that from his own daddy?

He was gone. He was gone forever.

She walked down the street and she cried. She cried for Forrester, and she cried because she was heartbroken, and the worst part was, there was nothing she could do. She couldn’t even tell Forrester that she forgave him, and that she still loved him, and that he didn’t have to fall for the cruel games of his dead father.