by Megyn Ward
He smiles at me, smoothing my hair out of face. “I’m gonna miss you.”
“I’m going to miss you too.” I give him a watery smile, when he presses his lips to my forehead before he lets me go.
“I met that young man of yours.”
My heart fluttering in my throat. “How did—”
He gives me another smile, this one laced with amused exasperation. “You really think I’d let my daughter run off and join the circus without checking out the Big Top first?”
My daughter.
“I like him.” He gives me a nod. “Good taste in beer. Great taste in cars.”
Spencer met Conner. Sought him out so he could take his measure. Make sure he was worthy of me.
It shouldn’t matter to me. It should probably make me angry, but it doesn’t.
“Thank you.” I don’t know what I’m thanking him for. For loving me. For being a safe harbor all these years. For letting me go.
“Loving you is something you never have to thank me for.” Stooping down, he picks up my backpack and slings the strap over his shoulder. “Come on, Sparkplug. Let your old man take you home.”
“Actually, I need to go to Cambridge first.” I smile up at him, looping my arm through his. “Think you can give me a lift?”
Seventy-one
Conner
As soon as Henley’s stepfather left, I closed the shop for the day. It’s Friday. I’ve got a volunteer shift at the library until eight. I run a movie night. Order pizza. Try to keep kids out of trouble. I wish someone had done it for Ryan. For my brother. If someone had, things might’ve turned out differently. After that the library, I’ll jump behind the bar and sling beer until close. After that, I’ll find Tess. Tell her I’m sorry for being such an asshole. She’ll forgive me, as long as they’re pancakes involved.
Upstairs, I hit the shower to scrape off my daily layer of grease and engine dust. I still can’t step in the shower without thinking about her. Can’t walk into the library without looking for her. Can’t look at a book without wondering it would sound like if she read it to me out loud.
I suspect it’s going to be like that for a while.
Probably forever.
But that’s okay.
Right now, I’m focused on the next thing. Then the next thing after that. I’ll keep moving. Keep going. That’s how you live.
You keep going.
Because Henley got on a plane forty-five minutes ago. She made her choice and it wasn’t me.
Shutting off the water, I grab a towel and give myself a quick rub down before slinging it around my hips, I leave the bathroom, stepping almost immediately into the kitchen.
Henley is sitting in my chair.
Our chair.
Jesus, she looks good.
Bright red hair, pulled away from her freckled face. Jeans and boots. A sweater I recognize as one of her favorites.
Please let this be real.
“What are you doing here?”
As soon as she sees me she stands. She seems nervous. Like she doesn’t know what she’s doing here. “I want my book back.”
For a second, it doesn’t register. When it does, my heart starts knocking and thumping against my chest. “How many times do I have to tell you, Hennie? That book doesn’t belong to you.”
“What if I gave you something for it?” She chews on her bottom lip and wipes her hands on her jeans. “Like a trade.”
I move toward her slowly, crossing the short space between us until I’m close enough to touch her. She’s looking at me.
At my tattoos.
The story of us, I inked into my skin, so I could keep her with me.
I let her look. I want her to. I want her to see me. The real me.
The me who loves her.
“It’s gonna cost more than a couple of cookies this time. I’ve grown attached to it.”
“I don’t have any cookies.” Her mouth quirks at me and for a second, I see her. The skittish, awkward girl I fell in love with. “But I have something else you might be interested in.” She reaches into her pocket and pulls something out. Opening her hand, she holds it out to me.
A ring.
“It’s a Claddagh.” She says it quietly, face still aimed at the hand she’s holding between us. “Someone told me once that they have their own secret language…” She reaches for my right hand and slides it onto my middle finger. “When you wear it with the point of the heart aimed at your own, it means you belong to someone.” She finally looks up. Looks right at me.
She finally sees me.
“I’m a mess, Conner.” She shakes her head when I open my mouth. “I’m a mess… I know that. I know I’m hard to love. That my first instinct is to push away when I should be leaning in, but I want to lean into you.” She swallows hard and nods. “I don’t know anything about string theory. I don’t understand the alternate dimensions and universes that float around inside your head. I only know this one.”
She turns my hand over and gives me something.
Her ring.
The one I gave her.
I don’t know how she got it and I don’t ask.
I don’t care.
“I only know this universe, Conner, and this is it.” She looks up at me, her dark eyes wide, eating up the sight of me like she’s seeing me for the very first time. “This is the one where I choose you.”
I know what I’m supposed to do.
What I’m supposed to say but I don’t move. Don’t say a word.
I just look at her.
The way her hair frizzes around her temple a bit. The way her gold-tipped lashes flutter against her cheeks. The spill of freckles that fall down the bridge of her nose.
I’m remembering.
The time Henley chose me.
Then I push my ring onto her finger, aiming the point of it toward hers, before flashing her my dimples. “It’s a good start, O’Connell.” I pull her into my arms and hold her, lifting my hand to gently cup her face, loving the way her ring looks on my finger. “But if you want that book back, you’re going to have to work for it.”
Epilogue
Henley
“Ready for bed, bug?”
I pop my head into my daughter’s room to see her sitting up in bed, bright green eyes shining at me from her freshly-scrubbed freckled face. She doesn’t even have to ask. I know what she wants. I’m going to give in but I have to put up a fight first.
It’s sorta our thing.
“Spencer Rose,” I say shaking my head. “Not tonight, it’s past your bed time.” We named her after her grandfather. When I suggested the name Spencer, regardless of gender, Conner didn’t even blink. We call her Rosie unless she’s in trouble or we’re going through our nightly ritual.
“My bedtime isn’t for another fifteen minutes,” she says, shaking her head at like she’s disappointed in my for trying to pull a fast one on her. She’s three and a half and can tell time. Reads at a fourth-grade reading level and speaks fluent Spanish. Sometimes, I’ll hear snippets of conversations between her and Conner and I have no idea what they’re talking about. But she has friends and enjoys school. She likes playing with her cousins and she sleeps.
The first time she slept through the night, Conner cried like a baby.
“Fine,” I shake my head, like I’m doing her a favor, while I peruse her bookshelf “The Pokey Little Puppy?”
She scrunches up her nose at me.
“The Little Engine That Could?”
She shakes her head.
“Five beds for Betsy?”
She narrows her eyes at me.
“The Giving Tree?”
“Mom.”
The exasperation I hear in her voice is almost too much.
“Fine.” I pull the book she wants from the shelf. “You know, I could just call your dad in here and he can recite to you by heart.”
She shakes her head at me and settles back into the bed. “I want you to read it.” She puts her head on the
pillow and looks up at me while I settle in beside her. It’s not the books she wants me to read. Not really. It’s the inscription inside.
“I seriously question the appropriateness of reading The Great Gatsby to my three-year-old.”
“I’m three and a half,” she informs me, taking the worn paperback out of my lap to open it to the first page. “Now read, please.” She tacks on the please because she knows she’s supposed to, not because she wants to. “Start at the beginning.”
I look down at the page she’s holding open for me.
It’s the title page with PROPERTY OF BOSTON CITY LIBRARY stamped across the paper.
Below it is an inscription dated 2009. This is what she wants me to read. This is the beginning. Where her father and I started. Where she began. I read it to her in Gaelic first and she follows along. Conner is teaching her, but it’s a tricky language. She’s frustrated that it isn’t coming as easily to her as Spanish.
Henley –
Is breá liom tú.
Gan ainneoin,
ach mar gheall air.
I gcónaí.—
Conner
“In English,” she says, tracing the letters with her tiny fingers.
“It says, Henley, I love you. Not in spite of, but because. Love, Conner.”
She gives me a smile. Every time I read it to her, she smiles.
Flipping the page, I begin to read and she closes her eyes and starts to drift.