“Of course it’s a picture you sent her,” Ben said. “You fucking did everything to destroy her life.”
“Just show me the picture, Ben.”
He dug in his pocket and flicked his wrist before turning and walking away.
I bent my knees and lifted the piece of paper off the ground. It wasn’t an actual picture, but a printout of a picture.
Linda followed Ben and they were talking, but I didn’t bother to try and listen to them.
I turned the paper around and saw what it was.
The picture of Kinsley standing at the fence, after the horses were gone, after Lindsay was gone. Right before the final piece of my heart was stepped on when Kinsley and I weren’t together anymore.
I stood up, feeling the emotion that the picture brought back.
“Horses,” I said.
“What?” Linda asked.
“This picture. Know where it was taken. What it means. This was after…” I looked right at Ben. “… after everything happened. We lived in this house where there were horses next door. She loved the horses. The horses were taken away. Then we lost…” The emotion caught in the back of my throat. “I took this picture and she didn’t know. She didn’t even remember the moment.”
“Horses,” Ben said. “Where the hell are there horses around here? And this late?”
I walked the picture to Ben and offered it to him. “There’s your answer.”
“I don’t want that fucking thing,” he said. “I want my life back. The one I had before you.”
“The fake one. Hiding. Pretending.”
“Stop it,” Linda ordered. “Think. Right now.”
“We can go there,” I said. “To the old house and the horse farm.”
“Or check your place,” Ben said. “Since she goes running to the past as soon as things get shaky.”
Shaky how? What did you do to her?
It wasn’t my place to ask.
“I know this is obvious,” I said, “but can we try calling her? Texting? Anything?”
“Why didn’t I think of that?” Ben asked. “How simple…”
“Fuck off, man,” I yelled. “You are the one who did this. You put her in a corner and look at this shit. She’s thinking about all she lost and all she wants.” My eyes went wide. “Ah, fuck. All she wants…”
“I know what she wants,” Ben said. “And don’t say a word about the past, okay? We’re all moving forward. We just bought another building for her veterinarian practice.”
“That’s where she is,” I said. “She’s at her office. I bet you anything. Because she doesn’t want any of that shit, Ben. That’s what you want for her. The picture. It’s about the horses. The ones… it doesn’t even matter. She’s at her office. You should have thought about that before coming here to punch me.”
Ben looked flustered. Angry. He looked like he wanted to punch me again. Not that I could blame him. I messed up everything in his perfectly placed world. But the same thing happened to me. My perfectly placed world had been Kinsley, our little house, the horses out back, and the idea of becoming parents. And that was ripped away.
“I’m leaving,” Ben said.
He stormed away and got into his little, fancy car and sped away.
I stood there in the cool spring air as Linda touched my arm. “Brice…”
“Go back to your date,” I said.
“I’m sorry that happened. I don’t understand him sometimes. I think whatever he and Kinsley have…”
“I don’t want to hear it,” I said. “No offense.”
“Of course,” Linda said.
She slipped away, and I was alone.
Ben could drive fast, but my words would reach Kinsley faster.
Not that I planned some romantic goodbye through a text message, I just couldn’t believe it all came down to this.
Kins - I know you’re sitting there, trying to convince yourself of what you think is the right thing. You want more? Go for more. You want less? Go for less. But please don’t push your heart away. Your heart is who you are. You might have longer hair than before. You might look different because of time. But your heart is the same. And whatever your heart truly wants is what you should get. No matter the cost. You never lived in fear before, love, so why do that now? I may have been the one who pushed you past your fears, but you’re the one who stayed there. Go back to that place and live there. Live as wild as you want and dream as big as you can. You know I’ll always love you. There’s nothing in the world that can ever change that. You know I’ll always love our daughter. And it will forever hurt my heart that she never got the chance to grow into a young girl and watch her crazy parents be crazy in love.
I pressed the send button and slipped my phone into my pocket.
There was nothing left to say.
I was done with the entire situation.
Being this close to Kinsley and loving her was only going to end up hurting her.
Back inside, I walked to the bar and took out money.
“What the hell are you doing?” Lucky asked.
I slid the money toward him. “Shot of whiskey, please.”
“Brice…”
“Oh, I almost forgot. I quit.”
23
The Inside Picnic
Ben
Chrissy sat at the kitchen table with a pack of cigarettes next to her. She had a pot of coffee on the table, on a purple pot holder. She bit at her bottom lip so much and so often that it sometimes looked raw.
This was the face of total guilt.
She had already confessed what had happened and I did all I could to take the high road for her and still love her. I took the hit for it, blaming myself for being distant from her and putting her in a position where she thought that kind of stuff was okay.
But it wasn’t okay.
She hurt my heart. And maybe the right thing would have been to leave. She wanted another man? Go for it.
What stuck in my mind though was TJ. I couldn’t just leave TJ. I couldn’t just walk away from the kid. Another man had already done that to him. So, I took it upon myself to stick around and make this work.
Even if it was in the worst possible way.
“It’s after nine, Ben,” Chrissy whispered.
“And you’re drinking coffee and smoking?”
“I didn’t smoke.”
“I see cigarettes.”
“Full pack,” she said. “You can inspect them. God forbid, right?”
“You know how I feel about that.”
“I know,” she said. “And you now forever get to control me, right?”
“I never said that. When did I say I was going to control you?”
She shook her head. “Sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry,” I said. I tossed my jacket over the back of the chair. I pointed to the coffee. “Still warm?”
“Just made it.”
I pulled the chair out and sat down. We had that little mug set that was different colors. TJ got it for Chrissy last Christmas. I hated the set because it didn’t match anything in the kitchen, but Chrissy loved it. Because it was from TJ. And how could I not have that out on display, right?
I poured myself a cup of coffee. “What’s wrong?”
“It’s after nine. You just got home.”
“I was working.”
“You’re always working again…”
“I have to keep up with things, Chrissy. You know that. Come on. We’re so close to getting over the hump here. So much good is going to happen.”
“How do you not hate me right now?” she asked.
“What?”
“For what I did. You just…”
“I don’t want to hate you. I’m trying to move on like you are.”
“By working so much,” she said.
“Chrissy…”
“You realized what happened…”
I stood up without touching my coffee.
I walked to her and touched her shoulder. I kis
sed the top of her head. Her hair smelled like old smoke. I eyed the pack of cigarettes and knew if I opened them, there’d be a few missing. That would just start another argument.
“It’s going to work out,” I whispered. “I promise, Chrissy. I have everything planned out for us. You have nothing to worry about.”
“You always say that, Ben.”
“I love you and TJ so much. I’m going to take care of you for the rest of your lives.”
I kissed the top of her head again.
Upstairs, I checked on TJ.
He was passed out cold.
He was nervous about his baseball game tomorrow. He was going to get a chance to pitch.
That’s why I worked late tonight. So I could make sure I’d be there for the game. He had been talking about it for days and the closer the game got, the more nervous he got.
“You’re going to do amazing,” I whispered.
I went into mine and Chrissy’s bedroom and changed into pajamas. I looked out the window and saw Chrissy standing on the front lawn, hugging herself, smoking. The tip of the cigarette lighting up brightly with a fresh drag.
It hurt me to see her like this. So confused and distracted.
I was going to fix everything.
I’d be at TJ’s game. He’d do great. We’d go get ice cream. Back to a normal family. And when it all finally worked out, Chrissy and I would be married, with kids of our own, and this bump in the road would be miles behind us.
Because that was the plan.
And nothing could get in the way of my plan.
I stood at the desk and looked around.
Kinsley promised she’d be back in a minute.
When she returned, I pointed to a sign in the corner. A little boy in a field of dandelions with a puppy.
“That’s nice,” I said. “When did you get that?”
“A long time ago, Ben. You haven’t been here in a while.”
I swallowed hard. “You’re right. I’m sorry about that.”
“You never took what I did seriously, did you?”
“Of course I did… I do,” I said. “Just because I don’t understand the connection you have with animals doesn’t mean I don’t believe in what you do.”
“This is just a building for you,” she said. “And the other building you bought. You have everything already mapped out. Ready to go.”
“I thought you wanted that,” I said. “You were excited. We talked about it several times.”
“You talked about it, Ben. I never really wanted that.”
“So, what do you want then?” I asked.
She hugged herself, stuck between nervousness and tears.
I approached her and felt like I was a stranger to her.
“Kinsley. It’s me. Holding back isn’t an option anymore. I came home from work and you left a picture on the table for me? What is that supposed to mean?”
“That wasn’t for you,” she said. “I was just looking at it and had to get out of the house. I didn’t want to go to my father’s or Linda’s. So, I just came here. To try to think.”
“That picture though… there’s a story to it.”
“There’s a story to every picture.”
I rubbed my jaw. “I got into a fight with Brice tonight.”
“What?” Kinsley asked.
I showed her my jaw. “I went looking for him. That’s where my mind went first, Kinsley. When I saw you were gone.”
Her face flushed. “Ben…”
“It doesn’t matter. He told me what the picture meant. At least bits and pieces of it. So, what are you really doing here? You want to be done with all of this? I don’t want you forced into anything.”
“I don’t know what I want, Ben,” she said. “I love what I do here, and it matters to the people I see. But I never wanted to be kept in an office.”
“Horses,” I whispered.
“What?”
“Brice mentioned horses. That’s what you like?”
“There was a time, yeah. I’m not saying now though…”
“Then what are you saying?” I asked.
“I just needed to breathe in all of this, Ben. One week you’re here and the next week you’re working nonstop. One week I feel like things will be okay and the next I’m wondering about everything in life. And then you decide to just buy that other building. Fuck it, right? You buy a building and… now I’m to be some kind of partner with you?”
I touched my aching jaw again. “Right. I just plan and assume.” I turned my head, blinking my eyes.
“Ben… talk to me about it then.”
I jumped up on the desk and gritted my teeth. “I lost her long before the accident, Kinsley. Because of shit like this. But I didn’t know how else to save her. Everything I did was wrong, or done the wrong way, and I made it all worse. The harder things got, the more I tried to control it all. I worked late the night before the accident to try and free up time to be at TJ’s game. And I still managed to screw that up. All I can ever see is the future, Kinsley. I don’t know why. It’s all I’ve got. The future kept me sane after things with Chrissy got rocky. I feared losing her and TJ. So, I looked to the future. I worked for it. I had this vision of me coming home from work and finding her outside by the pool, relaxing. And TJ hanging out with some friends, working on baseball. I lived in that world so much that I lost reality. The same with you, Kinsley. I just keep looking to the future…”
“What is the future, Ben? What do you see for us?”
I slid off the desk and walked to her. I touched her arms. “Well… last year? Before all of this? I saw you running a few veterinarian practices. Being this strong and capable, beautiful woman who managed businesses. And us getting ready to get married. Already talking about kids. But then…”
Kinsley looked away. “You think I don’t want kids because of what happened.”
“I don’t know what you want, Kinsley. It’s not the easiest thing to talk about. And I can’t imagine what goes through your head. But I did this… I made it so the past wasn’t part of us. Because I just kept looking to the future.”
“The future you want,” she said. “You just included me in on it.”
“Then tell me your future,” I said. “Right now. Fuck the rest of the night and everything else. Here… watch…” I took my phone out and called our favorite Chinese takeout and ordered our favorite dishes.
Kinsley smiled as I remembered to get her a spring roll instead of an egg roll.
“There,” I said after ending the call. “Let’s sit right here and talk about the future. Your future. I want to know everything.”
“Okay,” Kinsley said. “Let me get some blankets from the back.”
“Perfect,” I said. “We’ll have a picnic right here on the floor.”
“I like that idea,” she said.
For the first time in a long time while near me… she smiled.
“I still don’t know how you do that,” she said.
I tapped the chopsticks together and got a good amount of lo mein and dangled it over my mouth and brought it down slowly.
“Practice,” I said as I chewed my food.
“You would say that,” Kinsley said.
“Here, give me your hand so I can show you.”
I leaned forward and took Kinsley’s hand. I positioned the chopsticks as needed.
“See, now when you move your fingers, they’ll close and open. You’ll figure it out. Try it.”
Kinsley moved her hand to her chicken and broccoli. She poked at a piece of chicken and the chopsticks fell out of her hand.
“Screw that,” she said. She lifted her plastic fork and stabbed the piece of chicken. “This works.”
I laughed. “You’re so damn beautiful, you know that?”
She looked at me and smiled. “Thanks.”
“Tell me about… anything.”
“My mother liked horses,” she said. “That’s why I liked horses. When she died, that was my way of connect
ing with her. I always wanted to become a veterinarian. I always wanted to have a horse farm too. Take care of horses. Maybe even care for horses that were sick or, you know, ones that were neglected or dying. Just to give them a good life.”
We can do that, Kinsley. No. You can do that. There’s money for that. I can find land and you can dream…
“That’s really amazing,” I said. “The story behind it.”
“As for the future? I don’t know, Ben. I don’t normally worry so much about it. I never know what’s coming through the door, so why think about it? I might get a new puppy, right? A little kid with a puppy. I might also get an elderly woman with an old dog that needs to be put down.”
“I can sort of relate to that,” I said. “Going into deals, you never know what will happen.”
“But you plan it all out…”
“I look at the good outcome,” I said. “Some deals go to shit. And, yeah, when they do, I let it get to me. That’s my fault. Each bad deal makes me feel like everything wrong with me and Chrissy was true. At the same time… everything that’s wrong with you and me… it’s like a slap in the face.”
“It doesn’t need to be, Ben. I came here tonight to just look around and think. Everything keeps moving faster and I don’t know…”
“It’s okay,” I said. I leaned forward and took her left hand. “This ring means more than what anyone can see. I had a plan and it got ruined.”
“I ruined it.”
“No. We both did. But I wanted you to wear this as a reminder that I can find a way to have plans broken and still survive.”
Kinsley swallowed hard. “I once thought about being a pilot.”
“What?”
“True story.”
“How do you go from caring for horses to flying an airplane?”
“I don’t know,” she said. “I just think things and get lost in it. I used to sit on my bed and pretend it was an airplane. And I’d fly people to see their families. Their friends. To go on vacation. It was a cool feeling.”
“You’re a cool person,” I said.
“Cool?”
“I don’t know,” I said. I laughed. “That was weird to say, right?”
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