Page 3 of At the Edge with You

Pain laces her words as she tells me, “They think it was a heart attack in his sleep. He said he wasn’t feeling well, kissed me, and then didn’t wake up. He’s gone. My love is gone.”

A sob I wasn’t prepared for leaves my lips, and I close my eyes as the tears burn down my skin. Phillip Winthrop didn’t have the patience for me, but he sure did show his love for me when it came to my skating. He was a man of few words, but his actions screamed his love.

God, he loved my grandma—and me, in his own way.

Could this day get any worse?

“You have to come home. I need you. Please.”

Yes. Yes, it can.

Home.

Thistlebrook, Tennessee.

A place I have refused to step back into for twenty years.

Yup, shaving my head is looking like a mighty great plan.

CHAPTER

TWO

Jett

I feel her slap upside my bicep before her throaty voice meets my ears. “Fix your face, Jett Thomas.”

For such a little thing pushing eighty-six, my great-nana can still sting my skin with ease. I look down at Beatrice Cook and shoot her a dark look. The sun shines off her freshly dyed pink hair as she beams up at me with bright-pink lipstick on her wrinkled lips. “Ow, Jesus, you old bat. Why’d you hit me so hard?”

“You’re glaring,” she says, setting me with a look with dark-brown eyes that don’t match her weathered face. No, those eyes are all-knowing and show she’s always up to something. Even now, her eyes are playful even if a bit somber. We are burying a very important person, not only to me, but also to our town.

“I’m always glaring. Pretty sure I came out of the womb glaring,” I mumble, and she snorts before wrapping her creased hands along my forearm. Along with her pink hair and pink lips, she’s sporting long claws of pink that I know are fake since she cannot cross-stitch with those talons. Bea is a wild lady. She doesn’t give a shit what people think. She volunteers at church,feeds the poor, bakes cookies for kids, and doesn’t miss a game of hockey on the weekends with her pink hair and loud mouth.

Everyone loves Bea.

But I’m her favorite.

“No, my sweet boy, you came out barking and fatter than ever.”

“I thought I was a baby, not a dog.”

“Could have fooled me,” she teases, patting my hand. “Told Maggie to return you to the pound multiple times.”

“It was only right since it was rude to leave my packmates to fend for themselves.”

“Exactly, you got steak, and they got kibble.”

“Unfair.”

“Tragic,” she volleys back, and we share a grin. She’s always said I remind her of my great-grandpa. I don’t remember him much, he passed when I was a baby, but he loved hockey and he loved Bea.

So, I’m proud to remind her of him.

She pats my arm again. “Enough of that. Why do you look like you want to cremate poor old Phillip instead of bury him in the ground?”

My brow furrows even more, the reality of the day making my chest ache. “When was it okay to start calling a funeral nice?” I ask incredulously, shaking my head as we walk toward where they’ll lay a man I respected more than anything to rest. “Oh, the flowers are so nice. Such a beautiful service. The sermon was so moving. They have such good food,” I say, mocking the townsfolk of Thistlebrook. “A man dies in his sleep, and it’s nice? I liked it better when people kept their mouths shut and cried.”

She grins. “Damn social media.”

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