Don't Let Go(52)

I pulled a book out, flipped through it, and set it on the floor. Pulled out another one and did the same. Again and again, thick atlases and small books. I moved the glassware to other shelves, and Noah silently picked up the books and began making stacks as I pulled faster and faster, not caring about what they were. Harley sniffed each one tentatively and would then look up at me with her little forehead creased like she wanted to understand the game but wasn’t catching on.
I kept tossing and Noah kept organizing, and if he didn’t know what I was doing, he didn’t say. And although I originally didn’t want him there, I found myself glad to not be alone.
It didn’t take long.
Two thick volumes on astronomy stuck together as I tried to pull one out. Rather grossed out, thinking something nasty had bonded them together over time, I tried to pry them apart to no avail.
“What the hell?” I said, garnering Noah’s attention.
“What’s the matter?”
“These are stuck, they’re—” I stopped short when I picked them up with two hands and felt the movement within. I stared at the books in my hand, looking closer at the seam between them. Bound with super glue.
My Nana Mae’s words about my mother’s teenage rebellion sung softly in my ear. “. . . carving out old books to hide things like letters from boys—and her daddy’s cigarettes.”
“Oh, my God,” I whispered, fighting against the burn that wanted to take me under.



Chapter 13

“Jules, what is it?” Noah asked, coming to stand beside me, his hand resting on the shelf as he looked down.
I opened the hard cardboard cover, and there it was. My past, my big never-talk-about-it secret. All the things I was never trusted to handle.
A large cavern had been carved into the two books, leaving only an inch of paper around the edges. In the hole were photographs and letters, and something that appeared to be bank statements.
“Son of a bitch,” Noah breathed.
I put a trembling hand inside and pulled out a handful of photos. One fell free and I knelt to pick it up. My breath caught as I saw it wasn’t one that was in Noah’s collection. It was of a man and woman, smiling, holding an infant.
My infant.
A noise escaped my throat and the book box and other photos slipped from my hand. Noah dropped to one knee when I melted into a sitting position.
“What?”
I held out the picture, one hand over my mouth as if that would hold all the crazy in, and I heard him swear under his breath.
“That had to be—”
“Right after,” I finished.
The image swam before my eyes and I kept blinking it clear, needing to see the people that raised my child. That taught him to say Mommy and Daddy and how to ride a bike. That kissed his hurts and hugged him through his successes, and made him a man.
“Fuck,” Noah said, rising in one movement and walking away a few steps, running fingers over his eyes. His breathing was louder, and I looked up to see him go stand in front of my painting, bracing one hand on the wall. “I’ve never seen them before,” he said, his voice low.
“Well, I guess my mother didn’t quite share everything, huh?” I said, tears coming freely once I finally let them have their way.
He drew in a long, labored breath and blew it out slowly, running another hand over his face before he turned back around. When he came back he slid his back down the wall and sat facing me. I sat cross-legged in my black leggings and wraparound black skirt, not caring. After a long look he picked up the box and positioned it between us. We each pulled things out and explored, reading letters written in longhand from Seth’s—mother. We touched crayon drawings and read his first poem. We looked over more snapshots of Seth and another boy, presumably a brother? Noah hadn’t seen those either, and we looked until there was nothing left.
I leaned over onto my elbows with my face in my hands.
“I’m sorry, Noah,” I said into them.
He was only a foot away and pulled my hands from my face. “For what?”
“This should have been our family,” I said, though very little sound went with the words. I was so tired, so wrung out, that even crying was too much effort. “My mother took that away and I let her do it.” My chin trembled, although I felt dried up. “We could have been a family.”
Noah’s eyes looked exhausted too, like he just wanted to sleep. He sat against the wall in his sweats and T-shirt with one knee up and the other leg sprawled out.
“Come here,” he said, putting his knee down.
The look on his face told me not to argue. I scooted up so that my cross-legged position had my knees resting on top of his. It was kind of intimate, and him still holding my hands didn’t help.
“You have a family, Jules,” he said, his voice soft but his expression still haunted by all that we’d seen. “Everything happens the way it’s supposed to happen.” He squeezed my hands tighter. “You had Becca. Seth’s parents got to raise a great kid they wouldn’t have otherwise.”
“And you?”
A stricken look passed over his face before he glazed it over, burying it forever. “I got to—make the world a safer place for them.”
The stab to my heart was physical, and I winced.
“I used to think about you when I was out in the field,” he said. “You and Seth.” He looked down at our hands. “I’d imagine what he was doing. What you were doing—” At my look of doubt, he added, “Yes, even though I was angry, I still thought about you.”