I stepped out of the bathroom as Sadie was getting ready to get out of the shower. I know we were both girls, women, whatever, but I didn’t want to overstep the privacy thing at all. I had been sitting on the floor while Sadie showered, talking, telling funny stories and jokes. It was so… relaxing. I felt like I was at home. Which was strange because I was in someone else’s home.

As I stood outside the door, I heard the sound of Sadie drying.

“You okay?” I asked.

“Fine,” she said.

A moment later she opened the door. A towel around her body. She frowned.

“What’s wrong?” I asked.

“Will you brush my hair?”

“Of course. Why don’t you get dressed and I’ll brush your hair.”

Sadie walked down the hall to her bedroom.

So far I had seen Sadie’s bedroom and that was it. If the house was anything like mine, then behind me down the hall was Jake’s room. A room that used to be something else.

Curiosity won the best of me and I started to walk down the hall. I regretted it the second I did it. But I couldn’t help myself. I went down to the door and reached for the doorknob. Behind the door was the master bedroom. Where Jake slept. Where Jake grieved. Where I wanted Jake to… heal. To love. To laugh. To…

“What the hell are you doing?”

I let out a yell and jumped.

I spun and Jake was a foot away.

“Jake.”

“You can’t go in there,” he growled at me.

“Jake… I wasn’t… I was…”

“Emily?” Sadie asked, popping out from her bedroom.

“Sadie, go into your room,” Jake said.

“Emily is going to brush my hair,” she said.

“No she’s not,” Jake said. “She has to go.”

“Jake…”

“Right?” Jake said with gritted teeth.

My back was stiff against the door.

“Sadie, I’m sorry,” I said. “I forgot I had something to do. I’ll make it up to you. Okay, sweetie? Go into your room.”

“Fine,” Sadie said. “This night used to be fun.”

The door shut.

“Jake.”

“Get out,” he said. “Just get out right now. You don’t get to come into this house and act like you own it.”

“What are you talking about?”

“You sat in her chair,” Jake said. “You put the dressings in the wrong spot. You tried to help so much. Just stop it. And now the room?”

“Your room,” I said. “I wanted to… I don’t know. I like you, Jake. I just wanted to see where you slept.”

“I don’t sleep in there,” he said.

“What?”

“I haven’t gone in that fucking room since…” Jake turned and faced the wall. He put two fists to the wall and shook his head. “Go home, Emily. Right now.”

“Jake… I don’t want to…”

“I didn’t ask,” he said. “I’m telling you to go.”

“I didn’t mean to sit in her chair,” I said. “I would never do anything to hurt you. To hurt her memory.”

“Don’t say it like that,” Jake growled. He opened his hands and spread them across the wall. He put his head to the wall. “Don’t say it… like she’s gone… forever…”

“Jake, what do you think…”

“Emily,” he said. “Just go. This is what I warned you about. Get the hell out of my house before I call the police.”

Both of my eyebrows went high in the air. Threatening me with the police?

I slowly crept by Jake. I thought about putting my hand to his back but I held back. I just walked down the hallway, looking at Sadie’s door. My heart ached and ripped into two. I wanted to stay and fight back at Jake but I didn’t want to make things so bad that I wouldn’t see him or Sadie ever again.

Remember when Jake brought me breakfast to make me not feel like I was dirty? I didn’t feel dirty then. I felt alive. Vibrant. Happy. But as I walked through his house, alone, knowing he and Sadie were hurting, that’s when I felt dirty.

During the walk across the lawn to my house I started to feel myself choke up a little. I went into my house and turned on the light in the living room. I had a house. I had stuff in that house. But I didn’t have a home.

I felt like I was going to be sick.

I fell to my knees and grabbed my stomach.

It’s happening again… I’m going to lose everything I love…

* * *

We begin to see the horizon, little fingers pulling, climbing, your touch to my back. Shivers are

everywhere we go we reach for hands that are hopefully empty. Hands that we

can hold me forever through the sunrise and beyond. The day is new but these feelings are

from yesterday while flirting with tomorrow. As soft as a feather with air ripping above and below, holding… holding…

holding… everything in place. I finally, oh finally, I feel it. I feel

steady

because of

you.

I stood and walked to the door and opened it. I threw the notebook and pen to the table. I was done writing. I felt so empty and wasted even though I was far from drunk.

There was a little breeze outside and I had felt a few droplets of rain hit me. Little tears falling from the night’s sky. I couldn't see a single star because of the cloud cover. But I could see Jake’s house.

I didn’t know what else I could do.

I didn’t know how to just let go either, if that was possible.

My mind tried to go back in time… to when something happened…

I shut my eyes and grabbed my beer.

I felt a little lick to my cheek and touched it, feeling the wetness from the raindrop.

Checking my phone I saw there was rain coming.

Of course there would be rain. Why not pack on the emotions even more. I was supposed to brush Sadie’s hair. I wanted to watch her bedtime routine with Jake. I wanted my heart full. I wanted to go downstairs with Jake and have him alone. See him in his own home. See him comfortable. All the little things we both wanted so bad.

But we were both alone. Again.

I finally succumbed to what the night had become. I had to think about what was next. That meant sleep and facing a new day. Facing Jake at some point. Knowing that we’d have to figure out where the line was for us to stop crossing it.

I opened the deck door and looked to the empty dining room table. The empty house, full of furniture. Maybe I shouldn’t have bought a house. Maybe I should have traveled. Cashed everything in and traveled. Write. Make money doing odds and ends. Living so…

“Fucked up,” a voice said.

I let out a scream.

I turned and saw the shadow of a man in the grass near the steps of my deck.

“Jake?” I asked.

“I’m so fucked up,” he said.

“What?”

“I don’t know how to let go. I don’t know how to move on. One second I feel okay and the next second I feel like the world is collapsing.” Jake took a step up. “I went to her grave today. To talk to her. Because that’s what they say to do, right? But I never got it. I never understood it. She’s not there. Everly is not fucking there.”

That was the first time I ever heard him speak her name.

I took a deep breath.

“Jake, is Sadie okay?”

He stepped up another step. He pulled the monitor out of his pocket and put it on the railing. “She’s asleep. I brushed her hair. I read her a book. She was worried about you, Emily. So fucking worried about you. I lied to her. Said you had a bellyache. She told me that my meatballs weren’t so famous after all. You believe that? She’s only four…”

“I believe it,” I said. “She’s amazing, Jake. She’s amazing because of you.”

Jake shook his head. “She’s amazing because of Everly. And that’s something I have to live with for the rest of my life. And you… you want to live with that for the rest of your life? Why?”

“Jake, this isn’t about me,” I said. “I said what I had to say already.”

“Right. You’re just going to be there all the time, huh? Never let it bother you?”

“I never said that,” I said. “But the way I feel…”

“It wasn’t supposed to be like this,” Jake said. “You get that, right? You went through it?”

Does he know…

“You mean my grandmother?” I asked.

“Yes.”

“Yeah.”

“Tell me then. Tell me, Emily.”

I swallowed hard. “There’s not much to tell, Jake. She needed me and I was there.”

“Your life was just… stopped. Because of her?”

“Yes.”

“Why did you do it?”

“I loved her, Jake,” I said. “She raised me, Jake. My parents weren’t good people. My father left when my mother got pregnant. And when my mother had me, she didn’t want to be a mother. The last I knew of them? My mother went to find my father so they could start over. They had another baby but that baby didn’t make it. So then they just destroyed each other. I was the lucky one. Abandoned yet lucky. My grandmother raised me. She taught me how to read, write, love, see the world differently than other people. I went off on my own when I was eighteen and wanted to conquer the world. But… that didn’t happen.”

I’m not talking about it, Jake. I’m not going there yet, Jake. Please…

“She got sick?” Jake asked.

“Yes.”

I felt a few splatters of raindrops to my cheek and forehead.

Both of us were hesitant, slowly reducing the space between each other.

“She got sick,” I said. “She had been sick but it caught up to her. She gave up her life for me, Jake. Raising me during a time when she should have been enjoying her life. But she carried so much guilt about my mother. I never wanted her to carry that guilt. She got sick and I took care of her. I watched the inevitable downfall of her. Losing her mind day by day. It was the worst few years of my life, Jake, but in some ways, the best. Because I got to experience all of her. During her moments of clarity she told me stories I’ll never forget. I got to hold her hand during her last moments. So in a way we both saved each other. That’s just how life goes, Jake.”

He was just a few feet from me.

The few droplets of rain were now a drizzle. A steady drizzle.

He was close enough to touch. So I did. I had to touch him. I had to feel him.

My fingertips slid down his cheek.

He just stared at me.

It took all of a few seconds before a stray tear fell from his left eye.

“Jake…”

“It was all so perfect, Emily,” he said. “The house, the baby, the ring on her finger. It was all lined up. The tree in the backyard? I hate that fucking thing. But she loved it. So I’ll never get rid of it. Her chair outside, inside, she’s everywhere. And tonight, you were everywhere.”

“Jake, I’m sorry if I…”

“No,” he said. His hands grabbed my sides. “That’s the thing… you were everywhere and it felt right. It felt good. It felt normal. So fucking normal. I stood there and caught myself moving the dressings because you had them in the wrong spot. Why the fuck does that matter? What the fuck is wrong with me?”

“You’re grieving,” I whispered. “And you have every right to do that.”

“Dammit, Emily,” he said. “Don’t you see how fucking perfect you are? There’s so much out there for you. So much you could do…”

“I’m where I want to be,” I said. “I swear to you, Jake.”

He reached for my hand and took it away from his face.

The drizzling rain kept hitting us.

“She went to get Sadie diapers,” he said. “She always forgot things. She was messy. She left her shoes everywhere. I was working on the car in the garage. A car that I keep working on just to pretend I have something to do. We played rock, paper, scissors. That’s what we did for fun. I won. She had to go get diapers. It was fine. Sadie was napping. I figured Everly would want to get out of the house anyway. You know? Go shopping a little, do something for herself. She backed out of the driveway and drove away. She made it less than a mile from the house, Emily. And…”

Jake ran his hands through his hair. He put his head back.

Please, Jake, don’t quit now. Give it to me. Give me the darkness. I’ll hold it for you. I swear. I… I love you, Jake.

He looked at me again.

I couldn’t tell if it was rain or tears.

“She always stopped at stop signs. Always. For three seconds. Not two. Three. It could be the most desolate area in the world but if there was a stop sign, she stopped. The police said she ran the stop sign. That’s what they tried to sell me. That she ran the fucking stop sign and was hit by a truck. The impact so hard that they believed there was no suffering. The driver was just barely under the level to be considered drunk. They said she was just cruising along and it slipped her mind to stop. She went through the stop sign at the wrong time. How the fuck does that happen?”

“Oh, shit,” I whispered. “Jake…”

“She always stopped. Three fucking seconds. They were always the longest three seconds of my life. So what was she doing? Huh? Checking her phone? Just happy to be outside the house without the baby? Or tired? I should have gotten up with Sadie more that week then, right? But no, she wanted to take the reins. So I got a little extra sleep. So what happened? Was she extra tired? Confused for that split second? Distracted? What the fuck…”

Jake’s voice crackled like he was a thirteen year old boy hitting puberty.

He turned and walked to the steps. He put a hand to each post and hung his head.

The rain started to pick up.

The rain pounded against his back, making his shirt cling to his muscular body.

“Jake, you didn’t do anything wrong. Neither did she. Nobody did anything wrong. It’s just… fate.”

“Fuck fate,” Jake yelled. “Fate has a little girl in bed right now, sleeping, knowing she’ll wake tomorrow and not have her mother. Fate is that I have to raise her alone. Fate is that everything that happens in our lives, it all stems from that one fucking moment. Fuck fate.”

“Fuck fate,” I said. “I agree, Jake. Fuck fate. Okay? Scream that if you need to. Fuck fate.”

I finally got the nerve to touch his back. My hand felt his wet shirt and his hard muscle.

The rain was coming down harder. I wanted to suggest we go inside but I didn’t want to poison this moment we were having together.

Jake stood tall and turned. “Fuck fate… it’s a lie, Em.”

“Yeah?”

“Fate brought you here. To this house. To my daughter. To me. So how can I be so angry at it? It took one thing I loved away and gave me something else to love. So what do I do now?”

Did Jake just admit he loved me?

I felt the rain bouncing off my face, my lips, clinging to my shirt. The sound of rain was soothing and beautiful, the look between myself and Jake was full of tension, passion, an angry heat that was building by the second.

“You do whatever you want,” I said. “And I’m going to be right here. I’ll never take away what you still have of her, Jake. I just want to put together something that looks like a future.”

“Goddammit,” Jake growled.

He moved at me again. His hands took me by the waist. He walked me back until I was against my own house. Just like once before.

He lifted me up so we were eye level. “You can hurt me, princess, but don’t ever hurt my daughter.”

“I never would, Jake. I love her. And I… I love you. I swear.”

“Fuck,” he said.

Then he kissed me.