Total pages in book: 18
Estimated words: 16571 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 83(@200wpm)___ 66(@250wpm)___ 55(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 16571 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 83(@200wpm)___ 66(@250wpm)___ 55(@300wpm)
I had pushed him away, too much of a reminder of everything that we had lost by coming here in the first place, too deep-seated in my pain to so much as look him in the eye.
"And you were going to let-" she begins, but then she stops herself, shakes her head. "What happened between you two? I thought you were just neighbors, that it was a territory dispute or something..."
"You ask him," Elias replies, his voice pulled taut. I can hear the months and years of pain in his tone, and it twists like a knife in my gut, the knowledge that I should have done more, that I could have done more, if I had tried.
She turns her gaze to me with an inquisitorial look. I can’t look at her, not quite. God knows she has seen the worst of me today, what with how I tried to stop her from coming here – not because I wanted June or Elias to suffer, of course, but because I had been consumed with the thought of losing her.
And letting her walk out of that door seemed tantamount to accepting that she would leave me, just the way Anna had, just the way my whole family had. That she’d chosen something else over the safety I offered her.
And the cruel selfishness was not lost on me – in fact, an hour or so after she left, once I had stopped brooding, I had taken off after her, determined to do what I could to help. But that didn’t remove the doubts she still clearly had about me, and the only way I’d get them off my chest was by telling the truth.
"I couldn’t stand to let anyone in after Anna,” I admit, lowering my gaze to the uneven wooden floorboards below. "Not after…losing everything. So I shut you out. the rest of the world too.”
Elias lets out a hiss through his teeth.
“Cousin, if you had come to us-"
"I know you would have helped," I shoot back. "But so much time had passed. And then I heard in town you had a wife. I…I couldn’t stand to see you with something I didn’t have. It reminded me of everything I’d lost."
The words come out of me piecemeal, and I struggle to say it out loud. None of it’s a lie, but I have been happy keeping this to myself for so long, it feels almost as though I am betraying myself by saying it out loud.
No, not happy. Happy’s not a word I would have used to describe myself, not for a long time. But I found myself able to cope with it, the sheer weight of everything bearing down on me, when I knew I didn’t have to risk losing anyone else. Keeping Elias at arm’s length, well, it might not have been the kindest way to go about it, but at least I knew where the hell I stood, right?
“I knew you didn’t want me here. I pretended you weren’t kin. Pushed it out of my mind. Didn’t even tell June I had any family out here, let alone that my cousin was my neighbor. Figured it was your loss,” Elias asks, his voice low and gruff.
I can still see a small part of the boy my cousin used to be, the pain in his eyes from everything we’ve lost. And it strikes me that, in the midst of all this, he lost me, too.
I pulled myself from his life and made it so he had no choice but to live it alone. The thought snaps like a blister against my skin, and, as I stare up at him, I realize how goddamn bad a cousin I’ve been.
"You should be worried about your wife and your daughter, not me!”
Cora’s eyes dance back and forth between us and she bites down hard on her lip, clearly not sure how to handle this mess. I stand up, squaring up against my brother, our eyes narrow as we glare each other down.
"You don’t get to come in here after all this time and act as though I’m the one who made the mistake," Elias growls. My first instinct is to plant my hands on his chest and shove him away – but that’s the instinct that landed me in this mess to begin with.
"Well, you better get used to it," I shoot back. "Because I’m not going anywhere."
His gaze shifts slightly, like he’s trying to take it in. But I stand my ground. I have spent enough time turning my back on my family, on the people I care about, just to protect myself from further harm.
But if Cora had listened to me, Elias might well have been without a wife and daughter right now – and it could all have been my fault.