Epilogue
Zoe
Two years later
“Sorry, sorry, sorry!” I call, bursting through the door, dropping my purse on the table, kicking off my shoes in the entry, not bothering to set them aside. I strip off my coat, sort of smooshing it, rather than actually hanging it, on the wall where Aiden installed a coatrack last year when he moved in. I count it a win that I don’t hear it slide to the floor when I hustle away toward the bedroom. As I pass through the living room, I notice my empty mug of tea from last night, my laptop closed and sitting on one of the couch cushions, my favorite throw blanket bundled in the spot where I’d sat last night, working on a brief while Aiden sat beside me, studying for a test he took early this morning.
I only wince for a second.
I’ve gotten more used to it now, more easy with myself and this space, over the last couple of years. I’m busy, that’s part of it—not so bound to routines anymore, and relishing some of the chaos of my job rather than trying to recover from it. But part of it is sharing this space with Aiden, finding my peace with him rather than in quiet, sleek, pristine rooms. It’s not always tidy in here when I get home, but it’s always restful, knowing he’s here or that he will be.
Well, it’s almost always restful.
Our bedroom looks a bit chaotic at the moment, a big open duffel on the bed, a stack of mostly unfolded clothes beside it, my half-formed efforts at packing this morning before I had to get to the office. Aiden’s boots and mine are beside each other on the ground, a lot of miles on them now. The sight’s not unfamiliar, and not just because Aiden and I started out going on weekend trips together, back when we were faking it. We’ve taken a lot of trips, me and him—at first, to places that were important for getting to know each other better, more honestly. To Florida, first, where we spent part of the Christmas holiday after the initial, somewhat strained efforts between me and the O’Learys when Aiden and I got back together. Outside of Barden, things had been—well, not easy, but easier between us, and as Aiden had promised, his parents had started to see me differently, especially when it turned out that Robert and I both had a lot to say about a show with a park ranger. Last year I’d started receiving a package from them once a month, addressed only to me. It’s always something jarred and homemade—pickles, jam, cherry syrup, orange marmalade. Two months ago, the package had included a recipe, and Aiden had smiled and smiled before sticking it to the fridge.
We’d gone to California too, in part to see my mother, but also so I could show Aiden where I’d grown up, where my father’s office had been, where I’d gone to school. I’d even shown him Christopher’s bar, part of my history, though he’d been grim faced and silent as we’d driven by. My mother, of course, loved him—she loves men, gorgeous ones especially—and Aiden had tolerated her fawning attentions, though in the hotel at night, curled around each other in bed, he’d asked, endearingly frustrated, “Why doesn’t she ever ask any questions about you?”
There’d been other trips: Colorado, to see friends from his previous job, and to teach me how to snowboard (not a successful endeavor, but I did like the snow pants). Vermont, last fall, where we’d taken an alarming number of pictures of turning leaves, laughing at night as we sorted through them (They all look the same!). Six months ago, our biggest trip, to Italy, Aiden’s first time out of the country and also probably the last time he ever tries to convince me to go topless on a beach.
Adventures, big and small, for the two of us.
He comes out of the bathroom then, dressed but his hair still wet from the shower, and I make a weak effort to ignore the heat that gathers low in my stomach, between my legs, at the sight of him. “How’d it go?” I ask.
He nods, gives me a small smile, and leans in to give me a kiss—a natural, quick intimacy that still makes me feel warm and safe all over. It’s like this now with me and Aiden, our lives joined in all the ways that matter, except the most official ones. I’m reluctant about that, for the obvious reasons, for mistakes I’ve made before, but lately—lately, I think: Maybe it’s time.
“All right, I think,” is all he says, but I’m guessing that means he aced it. He actually is a bit shy, Aiden; that’s what I’ve learned since I’ve been with him. What I used to think was dislike for me was—well, maybe partially dislike for me, once upon a time. But also shyness.
He’s been working to get certified as a paramedic instructor, a new challenge he’s excited about to add to everything else he’s doing. I’d be worried about his schedule, but it’s funny—we’re more alike than we’d thought, initially. We both like to stay busy, both enjoy the challenge of hard work. I’ve worked harder in the last year than I have in all the years I spent at Willis-Hanawalt, and all of it, even the tough parts, feel so good.
This weekend, some of the hardest work, some of the work we’ve shared between us, pays off.
“I’ll be ready in five minutes,” I say. “I’m sorry I’m late. I had this—”
He quiets me, putting his lips against my neck, pressing there softly before he says, “It’s okay. We’re not in a hurry.”
I shiver, close my eyes briefly to regain focus.
“Nervous?” I ask. He’ll do a speech at this, the dedication, and he doesn’t much like speeches. This one, I know almost nothing about, but I know he’s been working at it, late nights using my laptop, a little file in the corner of my desktop that’s titled For Aaron.
He only shakes his head.
I sort through the stack of clothes, shove a few things next to his in the duffel, grab my bag of toiletries from the bathroom. He leans in the doorway, watches me with a dangerous smile while I unzip my dress at the side, shimmy it down just for the gleam he gets in his eyes. “Bet you can’t wait to see me in flannel again,” I tease, rolling down my stockings with exaggerated slowness. Across the room, his eyes turn sharp, predatory.
“Zo,” he says, his voice low, “I’m sorry, but we’re going to be a little late.”
* * * *
Aiden
The campground went to Val.
No one pretends like it’s a joint affair, like Hammond’s got anything to do with it, but that’s just fine, I think. When I see Val and her three girls there, Hammond on the periphery, I think it’s still what Paul meant, back when he called me that day. This camp is like something that came from them, a future for their girls—older now, but still all giggling innocence, more interested in Zoe and her shiny hair and lip gloss than they are in me. We’ve gotten to know them more over the last couple of years, the group from the Stanton Valley Campground competition forming a little society of our own, meeting here every once in a while for hikes, for cards, for catching up.
That’s partly because there’d been genuine affection, even after what Zoe and I had done, especially after we’d made our apologies. But it’s also because Val realized quickly that her summer sleepaway camp for girls might benefit from year-round programming, and soon enough Stanton Valley had become a joint project, Sheree and Tom working with Val to plan outdoor excursions for her school and his community groups in the fall, Lorraine and Tom holding retreats for over-fifties in the springtime. Wilderness/Wellness, of course, needs a single-use space, and they’ve moved on here in Virginia, finding a spot about an hour west of here. A portion of Aaron’s money has been invested in the start-up.
But a portion of it has gone here too, to the acreage Zoe and I bought from Val and dedicated as a memorial forest, just over seventy acres that we’ve named after Aaron and that’ll be managed by a local land trust, used to teach summer campers about conservation and sustainability. Yesterday, our first morning here, I’d done the dedication, revealing the small sign Zoe and I had picked out a couple of months ago and making the speech I’d started writing over two years ago. My brother was more than just his addiction, it had started, and then I’d told them all that much more—how much he’d loved this camp, first of all. Being outside, no matter the hassles it caused him, healthwise. He liked the world, my brother, no matter how tough it always was on him.
It’d taken me a long time, lots of those damned group therapy meetings, to be strong enough to do that, and afterward, Zoe had hugged me tight and told me how proud she was. But she knows as well as I do that this, like everything else about the foundation we’ve started in my brother’s honor, is owed in part to her, to the work we did together to research and get it started. It’s a scholarship program, mostly, helping to fund rehabilitation and aftercare for addicts.
And if I’d thought Zoe was fierce before—well. Seeing her tackle her work at Legal Aid while she works with me on the foundation has given me a new perspective. She likes it out there—being challenged, solving problems, kicking ass. Lately, she and Marisela have been making noise about going out on their own, hanging out a shingle and shoring up funding to take their legal services work independent.
So maybe that’s why, on Sunday morning—a morning I’d hoped to spend sleeping in with her, pressed up close in the shoved-together bunks I’d arranged as soon as we’d arrived—she’d woken up early and nudged me awake, first with her sharp elbows and then, more effectively, with soft, tickling kisses along my abdomen. “I’m going to do the pole today,” she’d whispered, once I’d murmured enough to be counted awake.
“You’re damn right you are,” I’d said, catching her hips and pulling her closer.
“I think you spent too much time around Hammond yesterday,” she’d said, wriggling away, leaving me hard and aching.
We don’t get all that many lazy Sunday mornings, me and Zoe. She’s still got brunch, and every month or so it turns into a whole group affair—loud, sometimes hours-long meals, the kind of thing I once would’ve hated. But brunch has a lot of Zoe’s laughter, a lot of her teasing me, teasing her friends. It has her hand on my knee or on my back, some constant connection she keeps with me. And it’s got people I like too—I get Ahmed and Charlie to come when they can, but also every one of Zoe’s friends is a friend of mine, a family we’ve built between the two of us.
I grumble all the way on our hike out to the pole, a comical role reversal that Zoe doesn’t hesitate to remind me of. “Look at me, doing this hike, Boy Scout.” She turns to walk backward, grinning. “You’re dragging ass like it’s your first time out here.”
“I’m dragging ass because it’s eight in the morning and you gave me a hard-on.”
She gives an exaggerated pout, then places a finger over her mouth, shushing me.
Good thing too, because when we get to the clearing, Paul and Lorraine are already there, Val and Sheree too, all the kids nearby, laughing and drawing pictures in the red clay with sticks.
“I’m going first,” Zoe says, rushing to Paul for help getting harnessed in. Sheree comes up beside me, pats my shoulder. “Look at her now,” she says, shaking her head in surprise. “She’s tough, that one.”
“That she is.”
“Well done yesterday, Aiden,” says Val, flanking my other side. “I still think it would’ve been better with the microphone,” she adds, in true Val form, and I catch Sheree’s good-natured smirk in my peripheral. I think Sheree was relieved, honestly, not to get the camp. As much as she loves it here, I don’t know if she ever truly wanted to leave her school and her home, and anyways, Val’s as smart as Zoe knew all along, a good person to take this camp into the future.
I’m quiet, watching Zoe harness up, watching while she crouches down to say something to one of the twins, who laughs and puts her little hands on Zoe’s cheeks. I got no problem saying it takes my breath away, watching her, knowing she’s mine to love, and it’s still, no matter what I’ve done in the last couple of years, the thing that makes me most proud in my life. If Aaron were here, he’d love her too, and I’m proud I can think about that without feeling the big, black emptiness I used to feel. I still get that phantom-limb feeling, but somehow it’s become its own kind of comfort, knowing he’ll never really leave me.
Before she turns to climb, Zoe gives me a goofy thumbs-up, blows me a kiss. I make my face mock serious in challenge. I watch her go up, and with each handhold she takes it seems like my chest gets a little tighter—pride, sure, but also anticipation and gratitude and lust and love and every other thing Zoe makes me feel. Two years with her and I’m back in the world in ways I never even thought of when Aaron was still alive—traveling and making friends and hell, starting to be a teacher in the next couple months, so long as that test I took on Friday went as well as I thought. Two years with me and she goes to sleep at night excited about the next day, okay with herself and what she’s doing.
And that’s when I think it. Know it.
It’s not really relaxing, what I’m thinking—it’s not like a peace settles over me. It’s a change of plan, after all, something big I’m going to spring on the woman I love when she’s reaching the top of a high, lean pole, no matter that she’s strapped in, perfectly safe.
“Zo!” I shout up at her, knowing she won’t fall. She’s at the top, steady now, as good as Sheree ever was, arms loose at her sides. I may be far away, but I know her body so well, know when there’s no tension in it. She tips her chin down, finds me beneath her, my arms crossed over my chest, my feet planted apart. As loose as her body is up there, mine is tense and coiled, as alert now as I am out on the job. But this is it, this is the moment, no matter what I’d planned for later: the fire I was going to light for when she got home from work, the dark purple irises—her favorite—I was going to buy to stuff that damned vase full of, the one I know started this whole thing. I was going to ask Kit and Greer to hide back in our bedroom so they could scream and hop in delight once I’d asked her, same as they did when I went to them one night two months ago and asked them for help picking out a ring. To be honest, I’d asked for their permission first, but then for help with the ring, help they’d given with thrilled, clapping enthusiasm.
But this is it.
I take a deep breath, no way she can see that, but if she’s like me she might feel it, might feel a bit of what I’m feeling down here—sure as hell but also nervous as fuck.
“Marry me,” I call out, loud and steady. Beside me Paul claps his hands together once, and in my peripheral I see Lorraine lean into him. I’m not taking my eyes off Zoe up there, but I’ll bet Lorraine’s smile is a mile wide.
“Oh, Aiden,” says Val, a note of disappointment in her voice. “This is really all wrong. When Hammond proposed, he—”
“You cannot be serious with this, Val,” says Sheree, laughing. “This is the most romantic thing I’ve ever seen.”
Zoe hasn’t moved up there. She’s standing at the top of the pole as if she’s an extension of it, as if she’s just grown up to her full height. She wouldn’t want me to say so, but I like this about it most of all. Being on my knee in front of Zoe for this wouldn’t be down far enough for what I’m asking her, for how grateful I’ll be if she says yes. We’re done with debts, done with owing each other, but that doesn’t mean I’ll ever get used to the idea that I deserve her.
“I’d want to keep my name,” she shouts down, and Sheree laughs.
“Fine by me,” I say, trying to keep down the smile I feel breaking through.
“I’m not making a scrapbook, Val!”
“I give up,” Val mutters, but she directs her next comment to me. “Of course I’d give you a discount on the lodge as a reception space.”
If there’s more chatter I don’t hear it. I’m not going to hear anything until she answers me. Even from this far away I know her eyes are locked on mine; I can see that smile spreading across her face. I can feel her loving me all the way from up there, and she doesn’t need to say anything at all.
Because Zoe—beautiful, smart, kind, complicated Zoe, my Zoe, my future wife Zoe—she stretches her arms out, and with a shout of happiness, she takes the leap down to me.