Preston's Honor(23)

For a second I’d almost said to hell with it. To hell with brother honor. To hell with my word being any good. To hell with anything that didn’t involve my lips on Lia’s and the proclamation that she was mine, that she’d always been mine, regardless of contests or a spit-wet handshake, or even my palm on a Bible and the eyes of a thousand people bearing witness to a sworn oath.

What happened when your words agreed to something but your heart couldn’t be swayed? But then I’d remembered I was going away. She was so damn young and so was I for that matter. What was the point anyway? She’d responded to Cole just as I’d figured she would. If I was the one who could call her mine, would she have waited for me? The thought brought a sharp ache. Within my love for Lia had always existed an edge of pain and maybe it was best to get out from under the grip of something that brought as much hurt as it did joy. Time would do that. Distance would do that.

Aren’t you going to say goodbye to her?

I closed my eyes on the memory of how her soft, slender body had felt pressed against me and how sweet she’d smelled. And that was the memory I wanted to take with me. Without turning, I answered, “I already did.”





CHAPTER SIX


Four Years Later

Annalia



“Hey, Annalia, are you coming with us?” I turned around to see Lacie heading for the door with her jacket slung over her arm. “We’re going to Brady’s. One drink?”

I paused, ready to say no, but then reconsidered. They’d asked me so many times and I always said no. Pretty soon they wouldn’t even ask me anymore. I could stop for one drink on my way home. Why not? “Sure.” I smiled. “I’m just finishing up here. I’ll be done in five.”

Lacie’s smile held a fair bit of surprise. “Awesome. We’ll see you there.” She waved as she pushed open the double glass door.

I quickly finished up the side work I’d been doing, removed my small waitressing apron and clocked out, calling a goodnight to the kitchen workers.

Fifteen minutes later I was pulling my small beater car up in front of Brady’s, a local dive bar, and hopping out. I’d stay for an hour tops and then head home. It’d been a long shift, and I was tired and smelled like syrup and bacon. It had been a pleasant, comforting smell once, but after four years, I was over it.

It was unseasonably hot, even for June, and though the sun had already set, the air was stuffy and still.

The state had officially declared a drought just two months earlier, but the local farmers had been worried about their crops far longer than that. We were a farming town and what happened at the farms affected every business in the area. So everyone was worried, living and breathing the weather forecast and glancing constantly at the sky for the most scant sign of rain even the experts may have missed.

I couldn’t help wondering about Sawyer Farm and how they were dealing with the drought. I’d spoken to Cole occasionally over the years, and I’d even seen him a couple of times when he’d come home for one break or another. He’d pulled me to him both times, smiling and kissing me, but we’d ended up talking more than making out. I wondered vaguely if Cole was seeing other girls in college but didn’t ask him. I sort of figured he was—and really, he should—but it didn’t weigh on my mind, so what was the point in potentially creating an uncomfortable situation or causing him to believe I was suggesting he shouldn’t be dating?

I’d attempted skating around the topic of Preston, but in the end, even though it still hurt that he’d never said goodbye, I’d been too desperate to hear any news of him, so I’d asked Cole how he was. Cole had told me he was enjoying college and finally letting loose a little bit, that the girls couldn’t get enough of him. A stab of jealousy had sliced into a tender spot inside me, and I’d barely stopped myself from wincing with the pain. I’d cried later, and then felt angry at myself for my tears. Preston was doing exactly as he should be doing—he was living his life. As far as I knew, he stayed on the East Coast during the summers, working, and taking classes even during breaks.

I’d become accustomed to not seeing the Sawyer boys for long stretches of time—even when they’d been living in the same town—so I continued as I had for most of my life: I loved them from afar.

And I was busy enough that my own life distracted me. I graduated high school, started working full time as a waitress at IHOP, and began making enough money that I moved Mama to an apartment in town. A studio was all I could afford and so my mama and I still slept in the same room, but it was bigger, with new carpeting on the floor, a small but clean kitchen, and a bathroom with an actual door. I wondered if other people smiled every time they clicked a lock behind themselves and figured they didn’t. It was a pitiful sort of joy, I supposed, but it was a joy nonetheless, and I would take what I could get in that arena. I always had.

My mama quit working at the motel and although I couldn’t do anything about her back—we didn’t have health insurance or enough money to go to a doctor, much less consider surgery—I felt pride in the fact that she no longer endured the physical labor that had caused her injury in the first place.

Though money was still very, very tight, I’d saved up over four years and finally had eight hundred dollars to buy my very first car: a silver Hyundai with almost two hundred thousand miles on its engine and rust on its fender. I had the interior detailed, hung a vanilla air freshener on the rearview mirror, and smiled every time I turned the key in the ignition. It was mine and I had earned it with hour after hour of hard, honest work.