21. Chapter 21

Chapter twenty-one

S am walked through the familiar hallway toward the desk she’d spent so many days and nights at in the past.

The second Scarlett had told her the wedding would be held back in their hometown, she knew she had to stop by the clinic to see Laura. Really, it was the only thing she actually looked forward to about being back.

Laura was one of the few constants of the town that only brought along pleasant memories.

She made her way to the end of the hall where a young woman stood at the side, looking down at her phone.

Sam cleared her throat as she approached.

The woman looked up at her, then smiled softly. “Hi,” she said, nodding toward the open meeting door behind her. “The next meeting doesn’t start for another thirty minutes or so, but feel free to wait inside.”

“Oh,” Sam muttered, “uh—actually, I was looking for someone. She works here. Laura. She runs the program.”

The young woman cocked her head slightly, thinking for a moment. “Oh! Yeah. Laura. I remember her.” Then her smile dropped, replaced with an apologetic frown. “Sorry. She hasn’t worked here for a while. She moved away last year.”

“Oh,” Sam muttered, a pang of disappointment running through her chest.

“The program is still running, though,” the woman said. “If you want to come to the next meeting, we’d be happy to have you.”

Sam forced a polite smile. “That’s okay. Thanks, though.”

She turned, trudging back down the hallway and out the double doors.

Her eyes floated over the mostly empty parking lot. And even that looked entirely different than she remembered. The asphalt had worn down even further, creating jagged cracks and potholes. And the paint had faded to the point of barely being able to tell where one spot ended and the next began.

Her drifting gaze landed on the old building of the diner. The windows were boarded-up and the lettering of the logo had been half-removed. There was a sign stuck up near the edge, labelled with some construction company. And she knew by the look of it that probably meant the building would be demolished at some point. It might even be the last time she saw it standing.

One of the places that housed the few truly happy memories of her childhood, ready to be torn down. Ripped away, like it had never existed at all.

She stared at it for a long moment.

Then she pulled out her phone, mapping to the one place she never expected to go back to.

***

Sam sat on the grass, staring at the headstone in front of her.

Richard Garcia. Loving husband and father.

Her eyes traced each letter of the words.

The first time she’d seen it at his funeral, she’d barely been able to read them without feeling an overwhelming sense of anger. And she realized then how long that anger had lasted. It didn’t truly dissipate until years later, when she’d seen it for the second time. And instead of anger, she felt a deep sadness.

Not for herself—but for his daughter.

For what she must have gone through.

And now, as she sat there, reading over the words once again, she felt an even deeper sadness for what she must be going through now as she grew older. As she grew to an age where she would finally begin to understand what really happened.

A faint vibration jolted her from her thoughts, and she instinctively reached for her pocket.

Her phone buzzed again as she pulled it out, the glow of the screen illuminating Jess’ name. She watched it for just a second, before swiping the screen and raising the phone to her ear.

“Hey,” she said, her voice coming out much more strained than she’d expected.

“Hey,” Jess answered, “My dad said I could use his truck today to drive to Scarlett’s for the rehearsal dinner. Do you want me to come by the hotel early? Then we could go to Scarlett’s together.”

Sam cleared her throat, trying to regain her normal tone. “Yeah, sure. Sounds good.”

“Great,” Jess said as the phone crackled with her movement. “I can pick you up in like ten minutes.”

“Oh,” Sam muttered, clearing her throat again. “I’m—not there right now. But I could order an Uber and probably be back in like an hour or so.”

“Where are you?” Jess asked, the phone crackling again. “I can pick you up wherever.”

Sam swallowed, glancing back up at the headstone, her eyes tracing over the words once more.Each jagged letter stared back like they held a permanent imprint of her previous anger.

“Sam?” Jess asked, her voice now more focused as the sounds in the background diminished.

“Yeah,” she mumbled, running a rough hand down her face. “Sorry. I’m uh—I’m at the Crest View Cemetery.”

A beat of silence passed, and Sam tensed, waiting for her reaction.

It wasn’t that she didn’t want to tell her. It was just that she didn’t want it to have to mean something.

She wasn’t even really sure why she’d chosen to go in the first place. Stopping there wasn’t part of the plan. But then, when she’d seen the diner closed down, she just needed—something.

The world had entirely moved on—erased every trace of her only good memories in the town. And at one point, when she was younger, she wanted nothing more than to have it all wiped away. To start fresh without any reminders of the past. Because maybe then, she could finally feel settled.

But now that it’d happened, it just left her feeling—empty.

“Do you want to be there for a while longer?” Jess’ gentle voice asked. “I could pick you up whenever you’re ready. It doesn’t have to be now.”

Sam frowned, shaking her head. Although Jess’ caring voice soothed that deep empty feeling that had built, something in her didn’t want to hear it.

“No,” she said, her voice finally returning to its normal state of strength. “It’s okay. I’m ready now.”

Jess was quiet for a moment before she replied, “Okay. I’ll come get you.”

***

Soft footsteps crunched behind her.

Sam glanced over her shoulder with a frown. “You didn’t have to come all the way in. I could’ve met you out front.”

She was about to stand, but Jess placed a soft hand on her shoulder, stopping her as she sat down beside her in the grass.

“That’s okay,” Jess said with a soft smile before turning toward the headstone. “Is that..”

Sam nodded, eyes trailing over the letters of his name. “Yeah.”

Jess stared silently. “I’m sorry. I should’ve known you might want to visit him while you were here. I would’ve offered to drive you.”

“It’s okay,” Sam replied, clearing her throat. “I didn’t really think of it until earlier when I was leaving the clinic.”

Jess turned to her, her brow wrinkling. “You went to the clinic?”

Sam nodded slowly. “I went to see Laura.” She shifted, pulling her knees up to her chest and resting her elbows against them. “She wasn’t there, though. I guess she moved, or something.”

“Oh,” Jess said quietly, frowning. “So you left and came here instead?”

“Yeah,” Sam muttered, biting the inside of her cheek. She didn’t know how to explain why she’d ended up there. Even though she knew Jess would be the only person to understand.

Jess studied her for a long moment. “Did you visit him the last time you came home?”

Sam stiffened slightly, caught off guard by the question. She’d forgotten about their conversation at the hotel.

She glanced over to the far side of the grounds, to the memorial wall.Although she’d been there that last time, visiting his grave that day wasn’t the reason.

“Yeah,” she whispered.

She could’ve left it at that. She didn’t have to tell Jess the whole story—the reason why she’d come home in the first place. And Jess would never know the difference.

Or maybe she would. She’d always had a way of reading through the things she left unsaid—of knowing her, even when she didn’t really know herself.

And maybe that’s why she felt the need to tell her, then.

“I—” she started, her voice coming out soft and weak in a way she hated. She cleared her throat. “When I came back that last time, it was for my mom.”

Although she kept her eyes on Ricky’s grave, she could feel Jess’ silent gaze burning into her.

She shifted beneath the weight of it.

“I bought a memorial space,” she continued, casting a pointed glance at the wall she now couldn’t stand to go to. “And I came back after they installed the plaque.”

Jess stayed quiet, her gaze expectant, like she was waiting for Sam to fill the silence. When the words didn’t come, Jess tilted her head slightly, her voice soft as she finally asked, “She didn’t have one before?”

Sam shook her head. “She didn’t leave behind any money.” She paused, shifting in the grass as she loosed a deep breath. “And we didn’t have any family to cover the costs. Chris was deployed, and even if he was here, I don’t think he would’ve paid for it, anyway.”

A chilled wind blew past, sending crisp russet leaves tumbling across the grass.

Sam pulled the sleeves of her hoodie down to cover her bare forearms as she continued. “When she died, the city cremated her. They sent the ashes overseas to Chris.” She tilted her head back slightly to feel the brisk air against her cheeks. “I think he just spread them wherever he was at the time.”

Jess placed a tender hand on her thigh. Sam looked down, watching it for a moment before taking her hand and lacing their fingers together.

“Did it bother you?” Jess asked, peering up at her. “I mean—not having somewhere to visit when you wanted to feel close to her again.”

Sam thought for a moment before turning to look at her. “Honestly? No. I didn’t understand that she wasn’t getting something that most other people did. I just thought it was normal.”

Jess nodded slowly, her eyes deeply focused on Sam’s, as if searching to see if there were any words she was leaving unsaid.

And she must have found whatever she was searching for, because her eyes changed with that knowing look she always got whenever she saw something within her that she couldn’t see herself.

“Did you visit the memorial today?”

Sam’s eyes flicked past Jess to the wall in the distance behind her.“No.”

Jess watched, her expression unchanged. And Sam knew then that she’d already known the answer.

“I thought,” Sam started, “that it would make me feel different somehow. Like closure or something.” She shook her head, brows tightening in frustration. “But—it didn’t.”

Jess nodded, her eyes flicking down to where their fingers intertwined. “I don’t know if anything ever really brings that closure,” she said softly.

Sam watched her, taking in every tiny detail in the way her eyes and brow tightened just the slightest bit. It reminded her of the first night they’d ever spoken about it. The first night Jess had really felt like more than just some girl she volunteered with.

“Did you visit your mom’s grave a lot when you were younger?”

Jess nodded slowly, her eyes still entirely focused on their hands. “I made my dad take me constantly, for a while.” She released a deep sigh. “But I could always tell something about it made him uncomfortable. Like he had to force himself to go every time I asked.”

She bit the edge of her lip, her eyes taking on that distant look Sam had seen many times before when they’d first met.

“Eventually,” Jess continued, “he started just waiting in the car while I would go in and visit. Back then, I thought he just didn’t care. I remember feeling so angry with him for it. But now—” She paused, an almost guilty look flashing over her face. “Now I know it wasn’t because he didn’t care. It was because he cared too much.”

Sam watched the flash of pain move through her features. Like she single-handedly blamed herself for causing him that pain.

She squeezed her hand gently, and Jess looked up at her, a pained smile barely gracing her lips.

“You never really told me about what happened back then,” Jess said quietly, her expression both careful and comforting all at once.

Sam swallowed, looking away toward the far off tree line surrounding the gates of the cemetery. “I don’t really think about it much.”

It wasn’t a lie. She barely left time in her day to think about anything more than the very necessities of work. And after she’d moved away, it made it even easier. There was rarely a reminder of those days.

Jess nodded slowly. “I can’t imagine how hard that would’ve been. To watch your parent do that—” She paused, as if catching herself. “Or—go through that.”

Sam shrugged, her mouth pressing into a tight line. “Every time she would relapse, it was almost better. I was less anxious then.”

Sam shifted, releasing a breath as certain memories floated through her vision, blocking everything else out.

“When she was sober,” she continued slowly, “the first couple days would always be good. It was like the way you feel before the weekend—the excitement on a Friday afternoon.”

Her eyes swam through the thick fog of memories, flickering to the memorial wall.

“But then,” she went on, “when you wake up Sunday morning, it feels different. Like you can’t even enjoy the last day of the weekend because you’re stuck thinking about Monday morning.”

Jess rubbed a light thumb across the back of her hand. “You knew what was coming.”

Sam pursed her lips, nodding once. “The longer it lasted—the longer she’d stay sober—the worse it was.”

Her head dropped slightly as a twinge of familiar guilt worked its way through her chest. “I think sometimes I almost wanted it to happen,” she whispered. “Just so I could stop obsessing over when it would happen.”

Jess turned to fully face her, placing her other hand on her thigh.

“And the longer it went on,” Sam continued, releasing a frustrated breath, “God, it felt like I was the one relapsing. I was so on edge all the time, and after a while it would just turn into this crazy rage.”

She closed her eyes as she exhaled, trying not to get lost in the guilt of those memories.

“Then she’d relapse and everything would go back to normal. Or at least, our version of normal. And I could finally stop worrying about when or how it would happen. I could focus on other things again.”

Sam took a deep breath, focusing in on Jess’ hand in her lap, like a tether that kept her from being consumed by the past.

“You weren’t wrong for feeling angry,” Jess whispered.

“I know,” she breathed.

And that was the truth. She did know. But knowing didn’t change anything.

“She’d always be such a mess on those first few days. She’d cry and apologize and say how horrible of a mom she was.” Sam sighed. “And I just had to pretend—to tell her it was okay. Because if I didn’t, if I got upset or angry, it would just make things worse.”

The last memories of her mother forced their way into her mind.

She swallowed, using all the strength she had to keep the sickening guilt at bay.

“I picked a fight with her,” Sam whispered, her throat suddenly feeling tight and raw.

She swallowed, keeping her eyes glued to Jess’ hand in her lap.

“That day—the morning before I went to school. She’d been sober for almost a month. The longest she’d lasted in a while. She wanted to walk me to school.”

The back of her eyes began to burn in a way she hadn’t felt in years. Or maybe even longer.

“I could tell she was trying to be a good mom. Trying to pretend like walking me to school was normal.”

She closed her eyes, seeing it play out in her mind. Seeing her mother’s face, and the healthier glow it’d finally begun to regain.

“And I just—broke,” she whispered. “I was so angry with her. It all felt like a lie. Like I was some toy she wanted to take out and play with whenever she felt like it.”

Sam shook her head. No matter how many times she thought about it—turned every thought and reason over in her head—it didn’t matter. Because no matter what the reasons were, it all still ended the same.

Good reasons didn’t change a bad outcome.

Sam hesitated, her eyes scanning Jess’ face, searching for any sign of judgment. Then she pressed on, the words crawling out like they were being dragged against their will.

“Everything I’d held in came out. I said— horrible things to her.”

Sam’s jaw tightened, the next words getting caught somewhere between her throat and her stomach.

Her hands fidgeted at her sides, brushing against the fabric of her jeans like she could scrub the memory away. “I thought she’d yell, or scream, or even cry. But she didn’t.” Her voice broke, the images flashing behind her eyes with cruel clarity. “She just looked—defeated.”

Jess squeezed her hand gently.

Sam’s chest rose and fell in a shallow breath, and she cast a reluctant look toward the far side of the grounds. “When I got home from school that day, she wasn’t there.” Her voice softened, becoming almost detached as she forced the last words out. “The cops showed up later that night.”

She took a deep breath, waiting for the crushing guilt to rush through her like it always did.

“Look at me,” Jess said, raising her hand and placing it on Sam’s cheek.

Sam looked up and saw a glassy sheen covering Jess’ eyes.

“You didn’t make that choice for her.”

Something in her eyes kept her grounded there. Not in the way it did when she forced herself to focus on something and drown out the thoughts she wanted to avoid.

But something else.

Something in Jess’ eyes—in her everything— kept her there . Kept her from being overtaken by the memories.

She’d never told anyone about that morning with her mom. Or at least, not the details. Not the parts that threatened to devour her if she let them linger for too long.

Even when she’d talked to Jess about it before, she’d kept those parts to herself. The worst parts.

And now, seeing that look in her eyes, she realized maybe that had been a mistake.Because if there was anyone she should’ve trusted with those parts of herself—it was the girl she’d loved more than anything.

Sam slowly leaned forward, closing the small gap between them.

She pressed her lips against hers. Not even wanting to kiss her, but instead just to feel her. To know that she was right there with her. That she wasn’t walking away.

She pulled her lips away, leaving her head resting against Jess’ forehead as she let her eyes close.

Jess’ hand ran up the back of her neck, nails scratching lightly against the skin in the way that never failed to soothe her.

Her other hand ran up the side of her jaw, past her temple, her fingers tangling in her hair as she stroked it back.

Sam released a breath, her shoulders relaxing for what felt like the first time since they’d arrived the day before.“I love it when you do that,” she whispered, leaning into the touch.

“I know,” Jess whispered, tilting her head to the side as she brushed her lips against her temple. “Stay with me tonight.”

She kissed her temple, then her cheek, before pulling her head back.

Sam raised her head slowly, blinking away the exhaustion that had begun to build in her eyes.

“My dad won’t be there,” Jess continued softly. “He’s going with Suki to some event for her work. He said they’ll be gone late.”

“Okay,” Sam answered, not even bothering to consider the alternative. It wouldn’t be any use, anyway. Even if she knew it might not be a good idea—that they shouldn’t be spending so many nights together when they still hadn’t talked about what any of it meant—or how it would end, she knew she wouldn’t be able to say no.

She wouldn’t be able to stay away from her.