Nate(95)

He started to grin but went sober again. “All that shit that happened when we were kids, when you came back and just how we all were… You were going through shit, but I wasn’t there for you. I’m sorry.”

I waved it off. “Listen. I was pissed at my parents. They shipped me off, and when you’re in high school, your friends are everything. I’m older, hopefully wiser, and I don’t agree with what my parents did, but it is what it is. When I got close to Aspen again, I worked through a lot of my anger at my mom and dad, letting them have it on a daily for a long while. The way I see it, parents are parents. You get what you get, and at some point, you have to accept who they are. But back then, I was angry and shut down. I was messed up, and then losing Owen put me in a whole other tailspin. I didn’t reach out, and you did come to me a few times. I shut you down, and that’s on me. It all worked out how it was supposed to work out. You love me. I know this. I love you. You know this. Same with every person in our group. It’s done, but you coming out and saying that? I appreciate it. Deep. I love you.”

He nodded, his eyes shining a bit. Seeing Mason like that was another first for me.

It humbled me because damn. Mason liked his kids, his wife, his brother, myself, and Channing, and that was about it. He had a fondness for a few others, and he tolerated everyone else, but even he had mellowed over the years. We were all just growing up.

I hoped that I’d still be growing up when I was in my eighties.

“So.” He picked up his glass, lounging back again. “You love her, huh?”

Oh, boy.

“Yeah. I love her.”

“Have you told her that?”

I shot him a look. So Mason. So wise. A dumbass, just like Logan at times.

He smiled back.

I rolled my eyes. “I will.”

“I have learned that the longer you take to say the important shit, the harder it gets to say.”

Yeah.

I seriously loved my family, but yeah.

I needed to tell Quincey.





54





Quincey





I made a call.

They were letting me go home today. I was cleared to resume my daily life, and I was hella missing Nova and Nate. Not that I hadn’t seen them. Nate brought Nova to see me the second day, and she had crawled all over me, playing with a new stuffed dragon that she got from Auntie Aspen. She named him Doug, and Nate said that now Miss Penguin and Doug were the new fixtures in Nova’s arms.

I loved it.

The phone calls happened on my second day.

Miss Patrice called. Matthew called. I got another phone number from him, one that I was going to reach out to later on.

Then in the early afternoon, the visitors started.

Graham and Britney came to visit. My mother and Guy came later. Nate came back in the evening. Aspen was with him. Taylor, too. Ricci. No Calihan, but I was okay with that. Cal was… complicated. I understood complicated. That had been me, and that brought me to the call I made.

I thought long and hard, but I needed to do it.

“Are you sure you want to risk this?”

The question came from Carl Mallone, my dad’s last PI, and I say the last because Duke fired him. When I called Carl, he explained that Duke wanted him to do surveillance on Nate and me.

Carl refused. Carl got fired.

A new PI was hired, but Carl assured me the second PI wasn’t good.

“All honesty, he’ll probably photoshop something if he can’t find anything and charge your dad double. Your dad will realize he’s been scammed and will fire him. I wouldn’t worry about the newest PI.”

I wasn’t worried, and maybe I should’ve been, but I wasn’t. Not about any current dirt my father was looking to unearth. I was worried he’d get someone to believe his accusation that I stepped in front of that car on purpose, and that would gut me. I didn’t do that, and I didn’t want Nova to grow up thinking I had done that. So, to end that all, I made the call to Carl.

And now, here I was.

He called back a day later with what I needed.

Now I just needed to find the courage to go through with it, and as I was sitting in my hospital room, waiting for Nate and the nurse to come to get me, the courage wasn’t in me.

I just wanted to go home.

I just wanted to hold my girl.

I just wanted to crawl in bed with Nate.

That was all I wanted.

My father was like a pretty snake with fur. A pretty furry snake with doe-like eyes that was poisonous. When you saw it, you didn’t know quite what it was, and you got pulled in by the fur and the doe-like eyes. You thought it was a long sort of wiener dog, and you didn’t know if you should think he was cute or a new sort of species, but then because you were confused, that was when he could strike and hurt you.

I needed to just shoo the snake out of the house.

That was what I was going to do, and that was why I called him to come here an hour before Nate was supposed to arrive.

Knock, knock.

There he was. My furry doe-eyed snake.

“Hi, Dad.”





*



NATE





I heard the voices as I approached.

I didn’t mean to eavesdrop, but… when I heard what I heard, I couldn’t move. Not a foot.