Cora,
I'm sorry. I have to leave. My family's situation is worse than I told you. They have my sealskin and they're using it to force me into things I won't do near you. If I stay, they'll come after you to get to me. I can't let that happen.
I'm going back home to handle this. I don't know how long it will take. I don't know if I can fix it. But I have to try.
I will call you when it is safe.
I'm sorry.
Muir
I fold the letter. I put it in the journal.
I spent four years angry at him. Four years building walls. Four years being right about the wrong story.
He tried. He left me everything he could. And I never saw it.
“Fuck,” I say.
Phineas slips back into the water without a word.
I pick up my shirt and shorts from where I left them. I walk up to my house, the journal and letter in my hands, and sit down in one of the alpine chairs on the porch, wrapping the Turkish blanket I keep there around my legs.
The lake stretches out in front of me. The sun is warm. The willow at the south end trails its fingers in the water.
I open the journal again. I read it from the beginning.
The sun has movedacross the sky when Rex's truck pulls into my driveway.
I don't look up. I'm reading the journal for the third time, the letter folded on my lap. The afternoon has passed in a blur. I haven't thought about tours or schedules or supplies. I haven't thought about work at all.
Rex's footsteps are quiet on the porch steps. He sits down in the chair beside me.
“Hey,” he says.
“Hey.”
He's quiet for a moment. Then: “Muir and I held it down today. Tours ran fine. Closing's handled.”
I nod. My throat is tight.
“You didn't think about work today, did you?” he asks.
“No.”
“Good.” His voice is warm. Proud, even. “That's really good, Cora.”
I look at him. His brown eyes are steady.
“You never step away,” he says. “Not once in the years I've known you. This is the first time you've let yourself feel something more important than the schedule.”
I don't know what to say to that.
He stands up. He leans down and kisses my forehead—warm, familial, the kind of gesture that saysI love youwithout needing the words.
“Muir and I are holding it down,” he says. “Easy peasy. Get some rest.”
He walks back to his truck then drives away.