Page 41 of Home Town Advantage
She turns her head, so our eyes meet again. “I don’t know that I can. It feels like I’m betraying him.”
I shake my head. “Just the opposite. You're honoring him. You know what being an architect meant to him. This is the only house he will ever design. You should be a part of it. He would want that.”
“He designed his cabin.Mycabin.”
“He roughly sketched that on a high school notepad. We made things up as we went along. If you knew how off-kilter some things in that house are, you’d laugh.Thishouse.Thishome. He designed it like the professional he should have become, and it will be built by actual construction professionals. It will be Finn O’Shea’s masterpiece.Finn’s Fantastic Designswill be the official architect of record. His unique vision will be on display in every corner of this house and will live on forever. I’m naming it Finn’s Farm.”
She covers her mouth as she lets out a loud sob. Every instinct in my body tells me to take her into my arms, but I know she doesn’t want that. I have to ball my fists because they’re trembling to comfort her.
I motion my head toward the door. “Come. You’ll regret it if you don’t.”
She wipes the tears from under her eyes and eventually nods. “Okay.”
We walk toward the area where the cement is currently pouring from the truck. I pull out his away jersey from our high school team. I know Sulley has his home jersey. It’s gotnumber twenty-two on it. I give her a small smile. “I love that you share the same number as him.”
She nods as she watches me toss it into the wet cement before it’s quickly swallowed down.
I then throw in a few photos of us. I have copies, but I want photos of us to be buried here.
After a few more small items are thrown in, things we collected through the years, I pull the last item off my wrist. It’s a small leather band. Sulley had bought them for us as holiday gifts one year. They were made from a football. She whispers, “You kept it.”
I nod. “We refused to call them friendship bracelets because that was so girly.”
She gives me a small smile.
I continue, “But we knew they were. He was buried with his. I thought I’d bury mine here.”
I toss it in, and we both look on as it disappears to its final resting place. Tears silently roll down her cheeks. It’s taking everything I have to hold mine back.
She tilts her head back and looks into the sky for a moment, as if communicating with him. Once she brings it back down, she unzips the small purse she’s wearing across her chest. She reaches in, and I inhale a sharp breath at what she pulls out.
“You don’t have to.”
She shakes her head. “I can’t explain it. I just have this strong feeling that he’d want me to.”
She takes one last long look at his dog tags before pulling one of the two off the chain, kissing it, and then throwing it into the cement. She squeezes the remaining tag with white-knuckle force as she watches its partner find its final resting place.
Both her gesture and seeing it disappear cause a wave of emotion to overtake my body. A large knot forms in my throat.
I don’t want her to see me like this, so I turn and quicklymake my way into a more private wooded area before eventually allowing myself to cry. My shoulders shake as it all hits me. I lean on a tree and sob in a way I haven’t since the day we found out he was killed.
Why him? He was such a good, honorable man. He didn’t deserve it. It’s been more than five years, and the pain feels as fresh as it did the day we lost him.
After a few minutes, I feel her hand on my back. Her touch is tentative at first, but she eventually wraps her arms around my body, sinks her face into my back, and sobs with me.
I turn around and do what I’ve wanted to do the whole time we’ve been here. I take her into my arms and hold her tight as we both freely release the emotions that have been constantly weighing on us.
Holding her feels so right. It feels like home.
TEN
SULLEY
We were eliminated from the playoffs this afternoon. It was a bummer, but our team overachieved for a first-year franchise. We’re still learning how to work together, and I’m truly excited about the future of this team.
I received the league’s Rookie of the Year award. While it’s always nice to be recognized for my efforts, I prefer team success as opposed to my individual success.
Nonetheless, making it to the playoffs was considered a victory. Reagan Daulton came into our locker room after the game to tell us how proud she is of us and how excited she is for next season.
