by Tess Oliver
Grady’s everlasting smile was now frozen in time, in a face that would never see the ravages of age. He would forever be a twenty-six-year-old man in our minds. There were pictures of him snowboarding, hanging out with friends and girlfriends, sitting in a work cubicle and even a few with him behind the wheel. As hesitant as I was to look at them at first, I had to agree with his dad. It made me feel better to see him happy and healthy and living a nice life.
I glanced down to the pile of papers on the chair next to me. A leather bound day planner was sitting on top of the pile. I picked it up and flipped through it. Even after four years in college, Grady’s penmanship was still the same scribbly mess I had always teased him about. Aside from business meetings, he’d jotted down reminders about birthdays and social events. I absently flipped to a page that was the first Monday in February. I stared down at the page. A painful lump grew in my throat. In the reminder section he’d made note of our day to call each other. That day it had been his turn to call me. But it wasn’t the phone call reminder that had struck me senseless. My stomach knotted along with my throat as I moved the pages to the first Monday of March.
Caden and his dad were discussing which pictures to use in a scrapbook. Their deep voices were a blur in my head. Tears burned my eyes as I ran my thumb over the same red ink message written in bold and underlined several times. “Tell Kenna I love her.”
I moved on to April, almost more as a punishment than out of curiosity. I deserved to feel the pain and betrayal of it all. “Tell Kenna I love her.” I slumped back against the chair. It seemed that Caden had noticed me splintering into a million pieces for the first time.
“Trinket? Are you all right?”
I looked up, fairly certain Caden had talked to me, but I wasn’t sure how to answer. My stomach pinched in on itself, and I feared that I’d throw up on Sally’s kitchen table and on the pictures of her dead son. The son who I thought I’d known well. I thought I’d known all of his hopes and dreams and even his secrets. But I hadn’t. Caden had tried to tell me, but I’d laughed it off and told him he was wrong.
“Kenna, are you all right?” Caden asked again.
I couldn’t look at him. I couldn’t look at his dad or at the pictures on the table. I dropped the book on the chair and ran from the house.
Chapter 27
Caden
It took me a second to comprehend what had just happened. I glanced over at my dad. He looked just as stunned as me. I got up to follow Kenna, and my eyes fell on Grady’s open day planner. The red ink and heavy lettering caught my attention. I picked up the notebook.
“Shit.” I turned to look out the kitchen window just as Kenna reached her front lawn. It was easy to see from the way she carried herself that she was crying. She ran toward the front steps and then stopped. She swung back around, raced back to the sidewalk and headed off in the direction of the park.
“What’s wrong, Caden?”
I closed the day planner and placed it back on the chair. “I need to go talk to Kenna, Dad. I’ll be back later.”
I raced out the door and took off at a run. I had no real plan of what to say or do once I reached Kenna. I hoped that my heart would step in and save me. I caught up to her just as she rounded the stone edged sign for the park.
“Kenna, stop. Let’s just talk.”
She ignored me and kept running. A group of people had decorated the picnic area with balloons, streamers and birthday party favors. Kenna ran past the celebration and headed up the trail to the campfire area. I slowed my pace and hung back, hoping she’d eventually slow or stop to talk to me.
She pushed angrily at the shrubs blocking the path. She was just feet from the top when her shoe hit a half-buried rock. She went flying toward the ground, landing on her hands and knees, just like the fall from the bike.
Her body was shaking with sobs by the time I reached her side.
She sat back, turned into my arms and cried. But seconds later, she pushed me away. “No, we can’t do this.” Tears streaked through the dust on her cheeks. “We have to stop.” She pushed to her feet and walked toward the campfire.
I followed behind her. “This doesn’t change how we feel about each other.”
“It has to. It changes everything, Caden. I can’t do this to him.” She wiped at her tears. “How selfish and ignorant I must have been not to know that he loved me. I won’t ever forgive myself.”
“You didn’t know because he kept his feelings to himself. You know how good he was at that. He was always the stoic, steadfast guy who didn’t let his emotions get in the way of anything. And you’re not selfish and ignorant. You were never like other girls. Your modesty never allowed you to believe that you were admired, that you were this unbelievable heartbreaker. Shit, Trinket, both Grady and I thought you were the only girl worth having, the only girl worth loving, and you had no idea.”
She gazed at me through teary eyes and shook her head. “It’s only because I was always around. I was your comfortable girl.”
“I’m standing here telling you, and you still refuse to believe it. You weren’t our comfortable girl. You were the high bar we set. You’re the reason why neither of us ever found anyone.”
“I was supposed to be his best friend,” she said on a cry. “What a shitty job I did in that role. I never knew how he really felt. And now—” She waved her arm toward me and then covered her face.
I badly wanted to touch her, to take her into my arms, but I kept my hands locked in fists at my sides. “I loved you too. All the while Grady was confiding in me and telling me how he really felt about you, I was keeping my own secret. It chewed me up inside, but I never told him.” I took a step toward her.
Kenna finally lifted her face to look at me. “When we were kids, I was over the top crazy about you, but I kept it from Grady too. Mostly because I knew it was a waste of my time and energy to have a crush on you.” A glimmer of a smile followed and I was relieved as hell to see it. “But mostly because I figured Grady would have teased me mercilessly about it.” She swallowed and took a breath. Her tears flowed again. “Now I’m thankful that I never told him. He would have been hurt. I might have lost him as a friend.” She looked behind her to make sure the bench was close enough and sat down hard, as if her knees had been kicked out from beneath her.
I walked over and sat down, not near enough to touch. Just near enough to make my case.
Kenna stared down at her feet. “As right as it feels being with you—” She lifted her face to look at me, and I knew, before the next words came off those soft, pink lips, lips I would never kiss again, I knew. “I can’t do this. It feels like the worst kind of betrayal.”
I didn’t know how to respond. I was feeling some of the same. Grady and I hadn’t talked about his feelings for Kenna for a long while. I’d been trying to justify my actions by assuring myself that he’d grown out of it. He’d gone off to college and a life away from Mayfair. I’d convinced myself that Grady had finally gotten past his feelings for Kenna. But the words, scratched so definitively in red in his planner, had made it painfully clear that my brother had still loved her. Just as my own feelings had never wavered.
Kenna pushed to her feet. “I need to get home.”
I moved to stand.
“But I want to walk back alone.”
I peered up at her. The anguish I felt was mirrored in her expression.
“I’m sorry, Cade. I’m going to need some time with this.”
Chapter 28
Kenna
I sat on the bed holding the Scooby stuffed toy in my lap. I hadn’t talked to or seen Caden since the day before, when I’d walked away from him at the park. I already missed him terribly. What had I done? How was I going to be able to just leave Mayfair and Caden without looking back?
It was strange how when things happened, t
hey almost inevitably happened in giant cloud bursts. You could go along for weeks or months, just plodding through life, doing the stuff you were supposed to do with no real drama or excitement to mix things up. They were the boring sections in life that could roll you into the doldrums, like those last few weeks of summer vacation from school when a triple digit California heat wave confined you to the house and you watched your last days of freedom pass by with nothing to do but sit inside and watch the front lawn sizzle like bacon. But then something happened, something bad, to toss you out of the doldrums and you longed for those days of watching the grass turn brown.
Grady’s death had started the cloud burst, and it had been pouring rain ever since. In a few short weeks, I’d lost a best friend, broken up with a fiancé, rethought my career a hundred times with no conclusive answers, and fallen wildly in love . . . for a second time . . . with the same guy. Now I wished I could just erase it all and transport myself back to my previous life, as unsatisfying as it was, just so I could get past the emotional turmoil.
Seeing Grady’s declaration of love had felt like a stab in the heart. All along, I’d felt little fingers of guilt poking me, telling me that a relationship with Caden was wrong. I’d been Grady’s best friend and being with his brother had shades of betrayal. Knowing now that, to Grady, I hadn’t just been a friend made that betrayal feel like a wet wool blanket, heavy and uncomfortable. It weighed on my shoulders, on my chest, on my whole body.
My phone rang, startling me from my gloomy thoughts. It was Jeremy, the last person I wanted to talk to, but I needed to tie up the frayed ends of my life soon. “Hello.”
“Kenna, it’s Jeremy.”
I nearly laughed into the phone at his business tone. I replied with the same formality. “Yes. How are you?”
“I’m fine. I have someone interested in moving into the apartment. I was just wondering when you could have your things out.”
I could have easily ripped into a rant about the fact that I’d been paying for half the apartment too, even though it had been way past my budget. But I wasn’t in the mood to get into it with him, especially because when Jeremy argued, the lawyer side of him took over. It wasn’t worth the stress.
“I’ll buy my ticket today and head back in the next few days. You’ll have to give me some time to find a place to stay.”
“Good luck with that,” he said with a snort. “You should have been doing that already. In the meantime, I’ve heard any affordable places near the school have all been snapped up.”
“Then I’ll buy a tent for Central Park,” I shot back, suddenly tired of the entire phone call. “You don’t have to worry about it or me.”
“I won’t. And don’t forget the ring.”
“Right. The ring.” I hung up and tossed my phone on the bed. He had every right to be angry and derisive. I deserved it. Although it seemed he’d gotten over the break up and me extremely fast. For the longest time, I’d stayed with him, thinking my feelings might change and that he would be badly hurt if I left. But I’d been silly. Jeremy had recovered quickly and without even a backward glance. At least that part of the cloud burst had gone off without too much drama.
I would fly back to New York and clear out my things quickly so Jeremy could get on with his life. I needed to do the same. I just wasn’t sure which direction I was heading anymore. In fact, it seemed I was more lost than ever. Only now, in the midst of it all, my heart had been shattered. That had been my fault too. I’d taken a chance and strayed from my straight, clear path. It had taken me straight into heartbreak.
Dad knocked on my door and poked his head inside. “Kenny? Want to come watch a scary movie? One of those really creepy head rolling, chainsaw buzzing, dum-dums going in dark rooms type of flicks.”
“Huh? Chainsaw buzzing and head rolling, you say?”
He stepped into the room wearing one of Mom’s many aprons. I lifted a brow and looked pointedly at the red checkered fabric.
He glanced down and shook his head. “Jeez, forgot she tied this damn thing on me.” He reached back and struggled with the knot. “Christ, that woman ties apron knots like a sailor. Kenny, give me a hand.” He walked over and turned around.
I reached up and started working on Mom’s iron knot.
Dad spoke toward the opposite wall, but I heard every heartfelt word. “Kenny, I don’t always know or understand everything that’s going on in your life, especially when it comes to relationships, but I just want to say that I like Caden. Always have. And in the end, it’s all about being happy.”
I untied the knot. He slipped the apron off his shoulders, balled it up in his hands and turned around. “Like me. I’m living my life with a woman who dresses me in aprons and makes me taste truffles to the point that my doctor is now scowling at me when he reads my blood tests.”
My eyes rounded. “Dad, tell her you need to go easy on the candy. And maybe she could find a more stylish man’s apron. Like one with the Superman logo on the front.” I reached up and took hold of his hand. “At least you’ve always been my Superman, Dad. And I promise, I will work toward being happy. Like you and Mom.”
I looked down at the Scooby toy. “I care deeply for Caden, but I found out yesterday that Grady was in love with me.”
“Yes.” Dad nodded and then squinted at me. “You didn’t know?”
“How the heck did everyone know this except me?”
Dad sat on the bed next to me. “Guess the poor kid worked hard to keep it from you. But it was pretty obvious. So that’s what all this is about? You don’t feel right being with Caden because of how Grady felt about you?”
“That pretty much sums it up.”
He patted my leg. “I’m not sure there’s any part of my Dad arsenal that can give you advice on that. It’s an unusual and sad situation. But I know you’ll figure it out, Kenna. You always make good decisions.” He leaned closer to lower his voice, even though Mom was clanging around in the kitchen. “Like dumping that pompous lawyer in New York.” He winked at me. “See. Good decision.”
“I agree, Dad. I have to go back there and clear out my things from the apartment. In fact, I’m going to buy a ticket today.”
He looked disappointed. “It’s been so great having you around, Kenny. Where will you live? I don’t like the thought of you living alone in a big city.”
“I’ll be fine. I’m sure I can find a roommate. I need to be near school.”
He got up. “I’ll start that movie whenever you’re ready. But first, you might want to head over to Kevin’s house. I saw Caden sawing away at the shrubs as if he was Edward Scissorhands on steroids. It’s what gave me the idea for the chainsaw movie.”
My dad was the one person who could make me laugh no matter how down and out I was feeling.
He stopped in the doorway. “Kenny, don’t leave Mayfair without seeing Caden first. I think you two need to clear things up or you’ll regret it for the rest of your life.” He walked out.
I stood from the bed and walked over to the window. I stared at the house across the street just as I’d done so often a teen, just waiting to catch a glimpse of Caden walking to his dad’s or leaving to go back to his mom’s. Dad was right. I couldn’t return to New York without talking to him.
I glanced in the bathroom mirror on the way out. A day of off and on crying had left me with puffy eyes and a less than pretty pink nose. But that was all right. I just needed to see him. I wasn’t completely sure what I’d say to him. I just wanted him to know that even though this went from hard to impossible, I still cared for him. I still loved him.
I took a deep breath and headed out the front door. I looked both ways and crossed the street. Kevin’s shrubs really had gotten a buzz cut. I walked up to the door and knocked several times.
Sally answered just as I turned to leave. She’d lost a good amou
nt of weight and had little color in her cheeks, but a polite grin crossed her face.
“Kenna, how are you?”
“I’m fine. How are you doing?”
“As good as can be expected.”
An awkward silence followed. I’d hardly seen or spoken to Sally since I’d been home, and suddenly, I was feeling guilty about it. “Is Caden around?”
“Yes, I mean no. He was here doing yard work but then he left. Said he was going back to the beach house.”
“Oh.” It took me a second to find my tongue. “All right. Thank you. I’ll be heading back to New York, and I just wanted to tell him good-bye.” I spoke as if I was reading directions off a manual. No emotion. Even though, inside, there was plenty of it going on.
“Oh, that’s too bad. We’ll miss having you around.”
“I’ll miss being here.” I could feel myself breaking apart. I needed badly to get off the porch. “Take care, Sally.” I spun around and ran back to my house. I shot inside and headed straight to my room, just like I used to do as a kid when something at school had upset me.
Luck was with me and I didn’t run into either parent. I closed my bedroom door behind me and flopped on the bed. I’d been such a fool. This was what happened when I stopped following my head and traipsed blindly after my heart. Two days. It had only been two days, and the second Caden had a chance, he’d headed straight back into the arms of the beautiful bikini model.
Chapter 29
Caden
I was still feeling the effects of Kenna’s leaving as if someone had punched me in the gut. She’d gone without a word or a text or a call. It seemed she wanted to make it clear that this should never have happened. Apparently, by being together, we’d crossed some invisible line or at least one that she’d created in her mind.