Page 51 of The Third Girl

CHAPTER 22

SKYLAR

It takes me longer than I’d like to deal with my hair, and by the time I’ve got it under control and mostly dry, Matt’s already in bed. I could let him be. I could leave him a note and go. Or I could hang out until he wakes up? I have no clue when Sailor will be back… along with her not-so-nice grandparents. Being here when they come back could be awkward. I’d hate to cause Matt any more grief. He took a beating from them today.

But. He specifically asked me to stay. And deep in my heart, I want to be here with him. There are so many thoughts swirling through my head. What does this mean? Are we going to hide this? Does it even matter what anyone thinks but us? Shrugging off my worries, I pull the covers back and slide in, lying next to him.

I haven’t been there more than thirty seconds when he rouses. “Let me hold you.” His voice is gruff with sleep, but he’s moved his arm and is patting his chest like I belong there. “I hate sleeping alone,” he mumbles.

Tears spring to my eyes, my heart aching for his loss and everything he’s been through. I hide my rollercoaster of emotion from him by scooting closer and resting my head on his chest. We lie together, our limbs intertwined. And it feels right. I never expected that it could be like this… that I’d feel so in tune with someone. But I also have some questions, and I need answers. “Are you awake?”

“Yeah. Enjoying having you here.”

I drag in an unsteady breath. “Why are your in-laws so upset with you?” I press my lips together thinking back to the conversation I hadn’t really meant to overhear but couldn’t help since Sailor’s grandparents weren’t exactly quiet. They’d been needlessly cruel to him and had made plenty of insinuations about our relationship and what it means… and spewed unkind things about me, too. I’m choosing to set that ugliness aside because they don’t know me at all. Which brings me back to wondering why they are so terribly upset.

“I wish I had a definitive answer to that.” His swallow is audible. “I made the mistake, in my grief, of telling them something that happened the night of Terri’s accident.”

“Oh. And they’ve been holding it against you?”

“You could say that.”

“People say and do awful things when they’re grieving.” My throat goes thick, thinking of my own family. We’d fallen apart so fast. “My parents divorced after my brother passed away. It was ugly.”

For several seconds, Matt is quiet, holding his breath. When he finally lets it out in a rush, he quietly says, “You had a brother?”

“Yes. Kevin. He was two years older than me. Seventeen when his body gave out. He had cancer. We’d hung in there all that time—through treatments and all the other crap that comes with that nasty disease… and then he was gone. And we fell apart. My parents argued viciously about whether it was right to have let him decline further treatment. It was a sad time.”

He takes a deep breath. “And you, what was your relationship with your brother like?”

I smile sadly, memories of my tall, strong brother filling my mind—because that’s the way I choose to remember him. Cancer was so, so brutal on his body, as were the subsequent treatments. He was never the same.

I wet my lips before responding. “I loved him so much. He was my protector, my advice giver… my safe place to fall when I felt like I couldn’t talk to my parents. We shared a bond that won’t ever be broken. I’ve thought about him every single day for the eleven years he’s been gone.”

Matt draws me closer to his side. “Does—” He stops, and I sense he’s struggling with whatever he wants to ask.

I look up, noting how hard his jaw is twitching. I swallow past the lump in my throat. “I’m here, Matt.” I scoot up further, molding my body to his and burying my face in the crook of his neck. For several moments, we do nothing more than lie there. I breathe him in. I won’t push him. Everyone deals differently.

He sighs heavily. “Does the pain ever go away?”

I press my lips to his throat before I answer. “Grief is a terrible thing. It twists our hearts and changes us forever. And it can lay dormant for the longest time, and then something will happen, and it’s like you’re reliving it all over again. I remember a period of time where I was so angry at the world. I questioned why he’d been taken from us and everyone else got to go on with their lives. It didn’t seem fair.”

“How’d you get past it?” The question rumbles from deep within his chest, the ache in his voice tearing me to pieces.

I wish I had a better answer for him. A happier one. But I won’t lie. I shake my head. “I haven’t. I’ve learned to live with it. I try to remember to do what makes me happy. I’ve tried to live my life in a way that would make him proud.” A tear slips down my cheek and lands on his shoulder. “S-Sorry.” I lift my head to wipe my fingers under my eyes, but he stops me, pulling me fully on top of him. He takes my head between his hands and draws me close so he can kiss the tears that are falling freely down my cheeks.

“It’s okay.” He rasps, “It hurts like hell sometimes, doesn’t it?”

I nod, staring into his glossy caramel-colored eyes. He pulls me back down, kissing me softly on an exhale, our breath mingling. I sit up, intending to climb off him, but he puts his hand up, splaying it across my abdomen over my sleep shirt. He focuses on it for a few moments, then looks up, his words so full of painful regret, I feel them deep inside.

“Terri and I had an argument the night she died. She was frustrated with my choice to work nights, wanted me to change shifts. My argument is the same today as it was then… I wanted to be there for them. And I thought—” He shakes his head, closing his eyes. When he opens them again, focusing on me, pain radiates from him, scorching a path right to my soul. “That night, I chose to ignore a couple of texts that came in while I was on duty. There was a miserable, horrible storm, and I was concentrating hard.” He swallows. “Somehow, we’d run out of diapers, and Terri had frantically texted me asking me to pick them up for her. I’ll never know if she thought I was angry with her and was being spiteful by not answering. But I wasn’t. It was just one of those awful nights at work.”

My brow furrows. I want to tell him it wasn’t his fault, but I know it won’t necessarily help, so I put my hands over his, binding him to me, and wait for him to finish.

“When I didn’t respond, she put Sailor in our SUV and headed out to the twenty-four-hour grocery store on Route 11. It was about three in the morning when I found her vehicle flipped in a ditch.” His breaths are ragged as his chest rises and falls. He gives a small shake of his head. “She was already gone.”

Oh, God.My heart is so heavy, feeling every ounce of his pain and remorse. I can’t stop the tears that leak from my eyes. My face screws up into what I’m sure is an impossibly ugly expression, part grief-stricken and part angry disbelief. “But how could they blame you?”

Matt grimaces. “In my head, I know it was a perfect storm of things that led to what happened that night. But in my heart, sometimes I—” He hesitates, searching my eyes. More quietly, he finishes, “Sometimes I agree with them. And that’s what makes it so damn hard. I don’t need for them to tell me what they think of me. That it was all my fault that Terri isn’t here with us. Because most days I’m already thinking it.”

I close my eyes, pursing my lips. I get it. “Most of the time, I wonder why I was the one to be allowed to reach adulthood, and Kevin was the one to get sick and never pass the age of seventeen. He missed out on so much of life. It hurts so badly sometimes.” I swallow hard. I can see from the gut-wrenching look on his face, he’s thinking of Terri missing out on Sailor. “All you can do is keep her alive in Sailor’s heart. Tell her all the stories, make sure she knows who her mama is. And love her enough for both of you.”

Matt pulls me down to his chest, wrapping his arms around me. The jerking and hitching as he tries to breathe makes me hurt for him. I hate to see this strong, dependable single dad fall apart, but I’m glad he trusts me enough to do it in front of me.

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