Page 89 of Someone to Remember
“I’m scared of the distance you’ve put between us this week.”
Tears immediately flood her eyes, making me feel guilty for addressing the elephant in the room.
I take the final step toward her, close enough now to put a hand on her shoulder. “I don’t want distance between us. I want you to run to me when you’re hurting, not push me away.”
“It makes no sense,” she saysgruffly.
I’m relieved that she’s not pushing me away. “What doesn’t, sweetheart?”
“I barely know them,” she says softly, “and I feel like it happened to me.”
“You certainly understand what she’s going through.”
“But I don’t. It’s happening to her for thesecond time, Adrian. How does anyone survive that?”
“The same way she survived it the first time, one minute at a time.”
She shakes her head. “I couldn’t do it again. I simply could not.”
“Yes, you could. You’d have to for our kids.”
“No.”
“Yes, Wynter, you would. You’d never leave them to fend for themselves in this world.”
Still shaking her head, she dissolves into sobs as I begin to understand why she’s pushed me away the last few days. If she makes me hate her, she won’t have to fear losing me. The thing is, though, I could never hate her.
I gather her in close to me. “I’m not going anywhere.”
“Will didn’t think he was either.”
“That was a random, freak accident. The odds of that happening to us or any of our widow friends are probably as astronomical as getting struck by lightning. It’s not going to happen.”
“Please don’t pretend that we aren’t as vulnerable to more loss simply because it’s happened before.”
“We can’t live in fear of it, though, or we’ll ruin the time we have left worrying about something that’s probably not going to happen.”
“‘Probably not’ isn’t good enough for me.”
“It’s all we have. That’s the best I can do in the way of assurances.”
“We should be there for Taylor.”
“No, we shouldn’t. Like you said, we barely know them,and like Iris said, we’re not under any obligation. Hopefully, she’ll rejoin the group and become another close friend, but for now… We’re not going to that funeral.”
Her muscles go rigid again. My love doesn’t like being told what to do. “What if I want to go?”
“It’s not in your best interest, and your absence wouldn’t hurt her in any way.”
She sighs and sags into my embrace. “I hate when you’re right.”
That makes me laugh. “Mick gave me Monday off. What do you say we go visit Grandma and Grandpa for the weekend?”
“You really want to go?”
“I want to be wherever you are, and I think getting out of here for a few days would be good for both of us.”
“Yes, it would. Let’s do it. We’ll use Jaden’s money. He’d approve.”
