“You know... those words... they blew my whole life off course. I feel like I’ve spent my whole life proving I wasn’t what you said I was. No matter what, I wouldneverhave said those things.”
“How... thehelldo you know that?” A surge of frustrated fury sent the words out cracked. “The thing I don’t think you realize, Avalon... is what a luxury it was to be allowed to beyourselfyour whole life. To justbe, without someone dictating who they think you ought to be, without being forced to live up to what began as an impossible ideal that ended as a giant lie. I had to figure everything out from nothing. Fromwreckage. I made sure I did it scrupulously, one step at a time. I made sure I was straight with everyone. I never cut a corner, and I never did anyone dirty. And now Iknowwho I am. And I just now told you the truth. Which you asked for. And apparently you don’t like it. I’m sorry I hurt you, but I don’t ever want to lie toyou.”
Her jaw got tauter and tauter as she listened to this.
“Okay. Fine, Mac,” she said evenly, ironically. “I get it. But the problem is... you think cutting everyone and everything out of your life means you’re tough. But I think all it really means is you’rescared. Scared of loose ends, scared of complications, scared to be disappointed, scared to be hurt. And who could possibly compete with your true love? Fear.”
“Guess it takes a coward to know one, huh?” he shot back.
There was a shocked little silence.
“What the hell isthatsupposed to mean?” It was practically a hiss.
“It means that I hurt youone time—and believe me, a lot of people go through lifecollectinghurt—and the rest of your disappointments or that twit Corncob or your other near misses aremyfault? Much easier to blame me than yourself, I guess.”
She reared back a little. Blinking in amazement. She stared at him for a second or two of assessing stillness.
And then the fight left her posture, like air slowly seeping from a balloon.
“You’re right,” she said, almost wonderingly. She gave a short, self-deprecating little laugh. “Iamscared.” It had the ring of finality about it.
“Avalon...” He took a desperate step forward. Her eyes gleamed with tears.
She shook her head implacably and stepped backward. “I’m heading to San Francisco this afternoon. Turns out Corbin made a hash of things and to make a long story short we now need an injection of cash to even meet rent and payroll by the end of the month. So I have a meeting with the potential buyer for the house while in the city. And all this means: you probably have about two days to offer me, in cash, what this house is now worth.”
Too many emotions at once bludgeoned him into silence.
“I’ll be back to wrap things up here by the weekend,” she added. “And then that’s it. I’ve decided I’ll be going back to San Francisco after that. I think whatever I came here to do is done. But... thanks for everything, Mac.”
She leaned forward then and punched him chummily in the shoulder.
And then turned around and took off at a jog.
He stalked back toward his cottage, his breath sawing as if he’d just been in an actual physical wrestling match.
He teetered like a drunk and sat down hard on the Adirondack chair in front of his house.
Then he bent his hands over his head like they tell you to do when the plane is heading into a nosedive. Won’t help much if it’sdeterminedto crash, of course. It was really just a formality, in that case.
Kind of felt like a formality right now, given that the crash had taken place.
He breathed in and out.
The anger was bitter and caustic in the back of his throat. Where it mingled with a very nearly primal fear.
If she wanted to go, if that was her plan all along, then why should he try to stop her?
Finally, he heaved a huge sigh, sat up, and closed his eyes.
If only she understood how brutally hard all of this really was for him. How ashamed he was to even admit that to himself, let alone her. He didn’t have the words to explain to her that his rigid pride, once his salvation, his armor, was a sort of bondage now, adhered to his soul like decades of paint adhered to a window.
But it had served him in life to date. It had gotten himthrough. It had formed the core of his personal credo, and for him, in the absence of any kind of safety net of a loving family, having a rigid credo had been like laying down a track under a runaway train.
Chaos had nearly crushed the life out of him when he was twenty-one, when he’d watched his dad hauled off by the feds, and then bore witness to the dismantling of his life in the light of public scorn.
All these years later, he thought he’d dug himself out of the wreckage of his life to get to this house. Which would be his way of getting back to himself.
He now knew in reality he’d been sifting through that wreckage in order to findher.