Page 94 of Back To You

“A long time coming,” my brother echoes, pulling me in for a hug, surrounded by Jack and my friends, as we cry together next to Bennett’s headstone.

Chapter 38

Annie

I’m running out of steam.

What is that Mia said? You can’t be someone’s strength when you’re at your weakest?

Technically, you can. I just highly recommend against it.

It’s been two weeks since Bennett’s funeral, and Luke is doing the best he can, as well as you can after losing your brother and punching your dad in the face at a funeral.

He’s been seeing a therapist, but the grief comes in waves. Some days, Luke seems okay, good even, but other days, he struggles to do anything but log in to his online therapy session or even get out of bed.

I knew this would happen, and I know it’s normal.

The reality of Bennett being gone will never get easier, and it’s a battle in itself to learn how to manage all the feelings that come with it, and I’m supporting Luke the best I can.

I just don’t know how much longer I can do this.

Don’t get me wrong. I will go to the ends of this fucking Earth to make sure Luke has what he needs during this difficult time. I will make sure he feels seen,valued, loved, and that he knows he is deserving of anything he needs to heal.

But I don’t know how much longer I can balance rotations, his Lenny’s shifts, and preparing his coffee shop for the soft opening in two weeks.

Luckily, he only has three bartending shifts a week, but the still-unnamed coffee shop is set to have its soft opening the first week of December, and we are in the 10-day countdown.

I assured Luke that I would handle everything until he was ready to take it all on again. It took some convincing, but I wasn’t going to take no for an answer.

I didn’t want him to feel rushed to jump back into work before he was ready or feel overwhelmed with everything to do when he finally did.

Emmett doesn’t know I’m taking Luke’s shifts because I didn’t add my name to the schedule, so he thinks Ava, Mickey, and Cyrus are. I’m hoping nobody thinks too much about it, and that I don’t fuck up payroll too badly—the extra money from the shifts would be nice, but the tips are good enough.

I know Emmett would offer to take them if he knew—but they are small eight-to-midnight weekday shifts that I could do in my sleep, and it’s not like I have a three-month baby to take care of when I get home like he does.

It just so happens that I’m not getting a ton of that sleep with how early I have to be at rotations the next morning.

I’m finishing up a shift at Lenny’s now—these weeknight shifts usually just need one bartender because they aren’t too busy—and I need to run next door to make sure a few decor pieces we ordered were delivered and put them inside.

I’m wiping down the bar, waiting for the last couple left to finish their drinks and leave so I can close for the night when my mind starts drifting from all the things I have to get done, all the things I have to do, to the memory that reminds me why I’m doing all of this in the first place.

***

“Who knew watching paint dry could be even more boring than they say,”I quip to the boys as I finish some charting from my rotation this afternoon that I brought home with me. I’m at the coffee shop, keeping Luke, Bennett, and Jack company while they paint the new drywall that went up earlier this week.

“Keep talking, and we’ll see how good this color looks when you’re covered in it,”Luke jokes as he runs the roller covered in the pastel blue color, Bennett and Jack chuckling as they work on the walls on either side of him.

“You know, all this watching is making me hungry,”I add, not being able to get the scent of the pizza place a few doors down out of my head, my stomach growling just thinking about it.

Luke turns to me and tosses the roller into the tray of paint; a few splotches dot his face, making his eyes look even more blue.

“One pepperoni pizza, coming up,” he announces as he walks over to the table I’m sitting at, leaning down to press a kiss to my lips.“What do you guys want?”Luke asks over his shoulder, Bennett and Jack tossing their paint brushes down on the plastic covering the floor and walking over to us.

“I’ll come with you,” Jack answers, before looking at Bennett.

“I’ll keep Annie company,”Bennett adds, sitting down at the table in front of me.

Bennett and I grew up side-by-side, but I wouldn’t say we grew up together. Him and Jack were always around when I’d be at theOwens’ house, but he was five, almost six, years older than us, so I wouldn’t see him at school past fifth grade, and I was too shy to ever hold a conversation with anyone besides Luke.

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