Page 62 of Not Our First Rodeo
“I should have seen it,” Beau says.
My heart cracks in two at how broken he sounds.
“I should have loved her better. I should have seen how broken she was, how much she needed me, but I thought she was…” he trails off. “I don’t know what I thought. I thought she didn’t need me, that she didn’t need anyone. And I was such an idiot to back off and give her space when she needed me to push her to let me in. It’s been destroying me, Coop, knowing that I couldn’t be there for her the way she needed.”
Tears sting my cheeks, falling in fat drops that land on my shirt, and my feet finally start moving, backing away from the door before either of them can see me. I stumble through the house and into the closest bathroom, everything a blur behind my misty eyes.
When I finally manage to lock the door behind me, sobs rack my frame. Guilt, hot and deep, stabs through me.
What have I done?
The thought goes around and around in my head. All this time, I held back, thinking I was protecting him, but I was onlyhurting him more.Destroyinghim. Breaking him in the way I was broken.
It makes nausea roil in my gut, but I tamp it down. Warm tears streak down my cheeks, and I don’t bother to wipe them away. For the first time, I let the years’ worth of hurt and guilt and shame wash over me. I allow myself to feel them all, because today is going to be the last day. Today is the last day I hurt others because I’m hurting. I’m done breaking the people I love because I’m broken.
I stay in the bathroom until my tears dry up, until I feel lighter than I have in months. Until I feel stable enough to push up off the toilet seat and splash cold water on my face.
When I catch my reflection in the mirror, I know there’s no way to hide that I’ve been crying. But for once, it doesn’t bother me. For once, I don’t care who knows that I locked myself in a bathroom and melted down.
I twist the knob and let myself out.
I need to find Beau.
Elsieisquietonthe way home, almost contemplative, but I don’t ask her to tell me what’s on her mind. I know tonight was overwhelming for her, that she went in expecting, for whatever reason, a much different reaction than the one that she got.
The truth is, I’m feeling a little raw too. I didn’t expect to break down during my conversation with Cooper, but the past year came at me like a bag of bricks, knocking the wind out of me. I watched Elsie tonight, seeing her so clearly, wondering how I missed the signs for so long. How I ever brushed off her retreat as resilience. All the times I let her pull away thinking she was strong enough not to need someone to lean on. I failed her, and this last year is as much my fault as it is hers.
The truck bumps over the dirt driveway, the lights slicing over the house. We accidentally left the light on in the front bathroom, and it makes the house glow golden. Looking at it now, I’m overwhelmed that we made it backheretogether. That we’re both living in this house again, working toward reconciliation, when we messed things up so royally before.
“Beau,” Elsie says, cutting into my thoughts. Her voice is small, quiet, but I hear a determination in it too. Like she’s been ruminating on that one word the whole way home. “I heard you with Cooper.”
I turn to face her in the darkness of the truck, my heart pounding. The headlights reflecting on the house illuminate her just enough for me to make out her features, the ones so familiar to me I could recite them from memory, trace them in my sleep.
There’s a set to her jaw, one I’ve seen before when she’s about to do something hard, like attempt a new jump or get lunch with her mom. But her eyes are soft. The way she’s looking at me is so tender I can feel it deep beneath my breastbone.
“What did you hear?” I ask.
“You didn’t fail me, Beau.”
Her words land like a jackhammer straight to my chest, knocking the wind out of me.
I shake my head. “I should have seen it. I should have.” I pause, searching for the words. “I should have known you better.”
Her smile is sad, and I swear I see a streak of silver in her eyes. “I didn’t let you.”
My hands reach out on instinct, pulling her close, and she melts into me like ice cream on a summer day, her head finding the crook of my neck she fits perfectly into, her fingers clasping my shirt right above my heart.
“I’m so sorry,” she whispers into my skin.
When I shake my head, my stubble catches in her hair. She smells like vanilla. Like Elsie and every good memory I have in my life. “I’m sorry, Els. I’m so sorry I didn’t see you, that I wasn’t there for you like you needed me to be.”
“I didn’t let you,” she says again.
“Maybe not,” I concede. “But I should have tried harder.” I pull back from her then, needing to see her face, needing her eyeson mine when I say this next part. “We both broke us, Elsie. It wasn’t just you. But we can put us back together again too.”
My heart pounds in my throat as I wait for her reply, half-worried she’s going to push me away again.
Her eyes hold mine, as familiar to me as the back of my own hand. I’ve looked into them so many times. On our wedding day, reciting our vows. The first time I met her, when they caught my attention and I knew I was a goner. All the times I’ve watched her fall apart, unable to look away. When she told me she was pregnant, the first time with hope in her eyes, the second with fear. I’ve lost myself in them too many times to count, and right now is no different.
