“I don’t mind hanging out in your cabin while you work,” I tell him.
“If you’re here, I’ll want to be with you the whole time. We’ll see each other soon. Just not this weekend.”
We may already be hundreds of miles apart, but it’s as if I can feel the distance growing. Something is different. He doesn’t sound right, and my instincts are telling me that I should proceed with caution.
“Is everything okay?”
“Yeah, why?”
I sit back on my heels. “I just feel like something is wrong and you’re not telling me.”
“That’s not the case, sweetheart. I want to see you, but this weekend is my first one back after being gone for weeks. I need to get caught up and let everyone else take a breather too. Plus, I have a possible wedding booking that I need to meet on Saturday. How about I come to you the following week?”
All of that seems completely reasonable. I’m being silly, and he doesn’t deserve me being a nutjob. Well, more of a nutjob than I already am.
“Are you sure?”
“Positive. I’d love to come out there and spend the weekend doing nothing but naked snuggling.”
I laugh a little. “Naked, huh?”
“Definitely.”
“All right. That is a plan I can get behind.”
Oliver and I talk a bit more, catching up on the changes his siblings have made and updates at my job. We saw each other six days ago, and I still feel as though the ground is shaking. When he is near, it’s steady. I miss steady.
I miss him.
I’ve always heard that long-distance relationships were hard, but I never truly knew just how hard. It’s like a part of you, the one you like and need, is missing. I can’t do anything but wait for it to be returned.
“Anything from Linda?” he asks.
“Just a text yesterday saying she needed time to process before she’d be able to speak to me again and that her lawyers would be in touch regarding my father’s will.”
“She’s something else . . .”
He isn’t wrong there. “I’ve been reaching out each day, wanting to see how she is.”
“I will never understand why,” Oliver muses.
“My father would’ve wanted it. Even though she didn’t hold to the same beliefs, I have to do what feels right. I want him to be proud of me, even now.”
At least that’s the line of crap I’m feeding myself. I don’t know why I’m being nice to her. She and Aunt Marie got into a huge argument after I left, and I doubt they’ll ever speak again. It’s as though Linda can be as ugly as she wants to the people who loved him now that he’s gone.
“He is. He has to be.”
I smile. “Cancer stole so much from him, but it never took his kindness. I watched his life fade away bit by bit and rob him of a future he should’ve had. It was impossible to understand or accept, but my father did it with humility. He was always good to people around him, even when they didn’t deserve it. I wanted to rage at everyone because it wasn’t fair. It’s never fair, and I don’t ever want to hear that word again, you know?”
“I understand.”
I sit on the kitchen stool. “I pray that no one in my life has to deal with it ever again. I know that’s unreasonable, but I just can’t handle it. I can’t watch it again, but I know at some point, I will.”
Oliver goes silent.
“Ollie?”
He clears his throat. “Sorry, phone cut out when I moved across the room.”
I had forgot how shitty service is on Melia Lake. “No worries. So, next weekend?”
“Next weekend.”
I am so looking forward to it.
Twenty-Eight
OLIVER
It’s pizza night at Grayson’s, and while I really didn’t want to come, I couldn’t come up with a good reason to skip. I haven’t seen Amelia in far too long, and if there’s anything in the world that can cheer me up, it’s my nieces and nephew.
So, tonight, I’m putting on my best smile and faking it.
“Uncle Oliver, do you believe in ghosts?”
“Not really,” I say to Melia as she brushes her doll’s hair.
“I do. I think they like to hunt people.”
“That’s . . . disturbing.”
Amelia puts the brush down. “On this one show I watched, the ghost tried to take over a little girl’s uncle’s body.”
“I don’t think they’d want mine.”
Hell, right now, I don’t want mine.
“Ghosts aren’t picky.”
There are multiple directions to take this conversation, and being that I am the asshole of the family, I stay the course.
“I think ghosts only like little kids. They want girls especially.”
Her head lifts. “Why?”
“Because they have long hair, and all ghosts really wish they had long hair so it flies in the wind as they float.”
I catalogue this as something Grayson will make me pay for later.
Amelia jumps a little and pats her hair. “Do you think they like little sisters?”
This is why Amelia is one of my favorite people in the universe. She’ll sacrifice a sibling if it means she survives. If we have a zombie apocalypse, I’m totally keeping her on my team.
“I know my ghost would like Aunt Stella’s hair.”
“She has really long hair.”
“She does.”
“I wonder if we could tell the ghost to take her instead.”
I chuckle. “I like that plan.”
Melia leaps forward, catching me off guard. “I love you the most, Uncle Oliver. Don’t ever leave me.”
“Leave you? Where would I go?”
She sits back down on the floor. “With your wife. Daddy said you love her and that he thinks you’re next to leave.”
Did he now? “I’m not planning to go anywhere.”
“Okay,” she whispers. “You’re my favorite.”
While I’d like to revel in this little declaration, my niece is a master at this game. She says the same thing to each of her uncles whenever they say something to make her happy. I may be the favorite right now, but if Josh gets her a doll or Alex sends her presents, then I’m back down in the pecking order.
“For today,” I say with a smirk.
“Just don’t die.”
My head jerks back, and my pulse spikes. “What?”
“That way you won’t be a ghost that takes my hair.”
My heart rate starts to return to normal. “I . . . okay.” I glance at the kitchen, needing to get some air. “I’m going to get some pizza, did you eat?”
Amelia sighs dramatically. “Dad made me eat.”
“Okay, I’ll come back later.”
She nods once and goes back to her dolls.
That one statement has me on edge. While I may be able to breathe again, I keep hearing her words: don’t die.
That’s the goal here, but what if? What if I do? What if I am sicker than I am prepared to be? I can’t . . . I can’t go there.
My hands grip the counter, and I focus on breathing. I need to rein myself in before I go down a hole I can’t escape.
“What is up with you?” Stella asks as she grabs a slice of pizza and tosses it onto my plate.
“What is wrong with you?” I toss back.
Stella leans against the counter. “Mature.”
“I always am.”
“No, you never are, but that’s beside the point. I’m serious, this week you’ve been sulky.”
“Sulky?”
“Yeah, moping around, whining about everything. You snapped at Jack and just ran away from Melia.”