Spells for Forgetting(65)

I could blame the island all I wanted, but I was the one who’d fucked everything up. For my mom, for Emery. The whole of the sea wouldn’t be able to wash out the stain of what I’d done. And I’d lived with that reality for years.

The woods were silent on the walk back to the cottage. When I reached the bend in the road, I could see Emery’s drive through the trees. The truck had been missing since I woke, and I tried to push the thought from my mind. Still, it strangled out everything else, making me feel like my boots were heavier on the ground. Was she at Dutch’s? How long after I left had they started seeing each other? Did she love him?

These were the questions I’d been asking myself since I’d seen them together at the shop. It was pathetic.

I’d wanted to believe that all this time, Emery was gone. That she left, like we said we would, and found a life somewhere else. But here she was, on Saoirse. With Dutch, of all people. Maybe that was my fault, too.

I willed myself to keep my eyes on the road until I reached the gate to the cottage, but when I pushed it open, I stopped short.

Up the path and framed by the two trees that arched over the pavers, Emery sat on the steps of the porch, watching me.

The stone walls of the cottage behind her were almost completely covered in the vines that snaked up and over the roof. I could see a flicker of light in the windows from where I’d left the kitchen light on.

I’d talked myself out of crossing the road and knocking on her door more than once since I’d seen her at the burial. A soft burn still traced over my knuckles where her hand had been, and I hated that it was one more memory I was taking with me.

She didn’t move as I came up the path. It wasn’t until I reached the porch that I could see how tired she looked. Her eyes and the tip of her nose were red, her hair only barely contained in the knot it was pulled into. It looked like she hadn’t slept.

She didn’t even have to say anything for my heart to start beating harder in my chest.

“Is everything okay?” I said, breaking the silence.

“No.”

I waited, my pulse climbing by the second.

She bit down on her bottom lip, tucking her hair behind her ears nervously. In that moment, it felt like we were kids again. In a way, we were, standing there having a conversation that should have happened long ago.

“Why weren’t you at the orchard before the party? Where were you?”

I drew in a deep breath, holding it. There were times when I’d wanted to tell Emery what happened that night. But the only thing worse than the barbed, cutting vines of the truth was the thought of Emery knowing it, too.

“I was at the lighthouse.”

She looked me in the eye, silently begging me not to do it. But what would be the point now, after everything?

“With Dutch.”

Pain knotted tight in my throat, sinking down into my chest. That was the well-rehearsed answer, but it hurt so much worse to say it now.

“I know, August,” she said, her face unreadable. She didn’t even blink. It was that small pause that made me feel like the ground would open up and swallow me whole. “I know that Dutch lied for you.”

I stopped breathing.

“I defended you.” Her voice wavered, and a tear slipped down her cheek. “I defended you when no one else did.”

“I know.” The words were a breath.

“I bore years of punishment for you. No one in this town would even look at me!” Her voice rose.

“I know!” I erupted. “You think I don’t know that?”

“Then why didn’t you tell me the truth?”

It was most likely the last time I’d ever see her. I’d leave Saoirse with that pain in my gut that I’d had for fourteen years. It never dulled. Never lightened. Wherever I went, it followed.

I’d accepted long ago that there was no healing for a wound like that. In many ways, I figured I deserved it. But I hadn’t seen that pain in anyone else until Emery sat there with tears in her eyes, asking for the truth. Not just because she wanted to know. In that moment, she was asking me to free her.

I’d lived for so long with that weight. But seeing it on Emery…

“This is it, August. I’m never going to ask you again. This is your chance to tell me what really happened that night.”

Despite everything, I realized, she was still taking care of me. Still trying to protect me. Even from herself.

“I have to ask you,” she said. “I have to know.”

I stilled, my eyes running over her face.

She’d never asked me. Not ever.

When the whole town wanted to know if I’d killed Lily, Emery had never said the words. She’d thought them. She’d wondered. I had seen it in her eyes a few times, and my heart would beat so hard that I couldn’t breathe. I’d wait in agony, praying that she wouldn’t ask, because I didn’t know if I could do it. I didn’t know if I was strong enough to look her in the eye and lie about that night.

Emery knew me too well. And maybe that’s why she hadn’t asked. Maybe she could tell just by looking that the answer would terrify her. That it would break the both of us. So she’d never asked and I’d never told her, and in the end, it broke us anyway.

“I guess it’s about time.” My voice deepened.

The look she gave me then felt like my soul splintering inside me. I knew what heartbreak looked like on her face, but there was no getting around that. Our hearts had been broken many times.