Page 158 of Always Meant for You
This is real.
And I don’t want to lose it.
As we near the food pantry, the shift in him deepens. He’s lost the color in his cheeks. He’s sinking into his pain.
I glance at the screen. Two minutes to go.
My cell buzzes.
Preston’s name lights up my phone with a text.
“It’s Preston,” I say. “They’re excited to see us.”
He nods.
It’s something.
I gesture to the GPS. “We’re almost there.”
He gives me another tight nod.
I can see the community center. It’s maybe six or seven blocks ahead. But Cal eases his foot off the gas. He slows the truck and pulls to the curb beside a row of narrow, brick-front homes pressed shoulder to shoulder. Time has worn them down. The stoops are chipped. A railing leans at a dangerous angle. A plastic chair sags on one porch, zip-tied to the post. A grocery cart rests at the edge of the sidewalk, half-filled with broken-down boxes and a stained tarp.
The pavement is cracked. Potholes pool with cloudy water. Someone’s hung laundry between two windows on the upper floor. A child’s tricycle leans against a rusting fence.
And then one detail cuts through the rest.
A shutter swings in the wind, its hinge bent, one corner dangling. It whines in the breeze.
“Cal, they’re expecting us to pull up to the loading dock.”
His hands remain on the wheel. He leans forward. His gaze is fixed on the attached home with the broken shutter.
My phone buzzes again.
I glance down. “Preston texted again. We’re nearly there.”
“I know where we are, Mabel. And I know they’re expecting us. I need a second,” he whispers, the words scratching out of him.
The air shifts, heavy with the kind of pain that leaves no wound but shapes every breath that follows. I want to hold him. But I stay where I am.
“Okay,” I say. “We can wait. There’s no hurry.”
His grip tightens, fingers clenching around the steering wheel like it’s the only thing holding him together. A tremor moves across his jaw. His chest rises, but he doesn’t exhale. He doesn’t blink. And that’s when I know. He’s not thinking. He’s remembering.
Chapter Thirty
CAL
I know this place. I stare at the crumbling row house. A shutter hangs from one hinge, tapping rhythmically against the brick, a tired heartbeat in the wind. I zero in on the metal numbers bolted carelessly above the door.
234
The four is crooked. It still hangs on a rusty screw. Christ, it might be the same screw from all those years ago. That four had been a landmark for me, helping me find my way home when I’d venture out alone.
The images rush in. I see tangled auburn hair, pale arms marked by fading bruises, and those wide, stormy-blue eyes.
My eyes.
