The Light We Lost (Lost and Found in Wallowpine Book 2), page 36
Sensing no hesitation on his end, I peeled the lid off. My stomach dropped at the whiskey bottle wedged inside. It was unopened, the amber liquid sealed behind glass. Not wanting to focus on it, I removed the bottle and set it on the table. Whatever heartache the alcohol inflicted vanished at the sight of what remained in the box.
There were pictures. Pictures of me, as well as Nolan and me together. There was a picture of us holding Genny, the three of us beneath a Christmas tree. It was from our first and only Christmas together as a married couple. There was a baseball stored inside. One of my old bandanas. A bag of Lucky Charms. Glow-in-the-dark stars. Our wedding bands. The more I sorted through the box, the more it felt like a key to the past.
“Why do you have a bottle of whiskey?” I asked, not understanding why he’d keep it if he no longer drank.
“Before, when I was stressed out or down, I’d reach for the bottle. I thought I needed it.” A faint smile crossed his lips. “It sounds kind of dumb . . . but when I feel that way now, I like having the bottle around. Like knowing it’s available, and if I wanted to, I could reach for it. I could numb myself. But I don’t, and it’s not because there’s no alcohol around to tempt me. It’s because I made the choice not to. Makes me feel not so weak.”
I nodded, feeling like the pieces of the puzzle were coming together. I understood his logic. I understood how this could make him feel stronger. But I’d never thought of him as weak, and there was one thing I didn’t understand. “Why store it in this box?” I asked, my voice careful. “Why with these . . . pieces of your life?”
He looked at me like he thought the answer was easy. “So I don’t ever forget what picking up the bottle cost me. I want to remember everything I lost.”
Something in me broke as I realized it wasn’t sorrow in Nolan’s eyes, it was acceptance. He’d accepted that those parts of his life were gone, unreachable to him. The longer I stared at the box, the more I understood and the more my heart shattered.
Our marriage. Me. There was even the braided grass bracelet he’d snatched a few weeks ago. A dried golden flower from our garden. These pieces of his life still existed, yet he’d accepted they were already gone.
As though he didn’t deserve them.
“They don’t look so lost to me.” He didn’t respond, and I didn’t expect him to. His silence was answer enough, confirming my thoughts. It was the same thought I’d had when he told me he’d accepted his mom leaving. Leaning away from him, I set the box on the table before I faced him again, releasing a steadying breath. “I need you to do something for me.”
He dipped his chin, not even asking what it might be. “Anything.”
I smiled softly, glad to hear it. “I need you to resize the flower boxes you made so they’ll fit our house windows. I already measured, and they’re an inch too big.” His frame tensed, and if I peered deep into his eyes, I could see not only the recognition forming, but his walls building too. They were the same walls he’d had up when he’d given me the flower boxes. Even when he suggested I go back to New York early.
He could build all the walls he wanted—it wouldn’t be enough.
I ran my fingers through his hair, ensuring every bit of his gaze was on me. “I love you, Nolan . . . and I’m staying.” I pressed my lips to his, quieting the panic that was surely there, and repeated, “I’m staying.”
“Indy . . .” His throat bobbed. “You’re not. You can’t.” The disbelief in his voice was enough to cut me open. “You have your interview. A job waiting for you in New York.”
“I don’t.” They wouldn’t see the email I’d sent until the morning, but it was a done deal. “I asked them to remove me from consideration.”
His eyes widened as though I’d lost my mind. But I’d never felt more sure in my life. “You can’t, Indy . . . This was only supposed to be for a month. Your future isn’t here.”
“I decide where my future is.” I grabbed his hand, holding on through every word. “I’m not asking for permission, Nolan. You told me I didn’t have to. You said to take up the whole damn world. And this is where I want to be.”
He shook his head. “You can’t.”
“Why can’t I?” I pressed, my tone harder than before. Not because I was angry, but because I refused to let him do this. Not again. Feeling him shift beneath me, I straddled his waist, stopping him from getting up. “Tell me why I can’t be here. If you don’t love me, tell me now.”
It didn’t matter if I hadn’t heard those words from him in nearly a decade—Nolan loved me. I felt it.
“Of course I love you,” he whispered, the promise of his words brushing against my skin. “Loving you has never been the problem, Indy.”
Warmth radiated throughout me, his words a relief. No matter how confident I was in his feelings, there was no denying how amazing it felt to hear it. “Then what’s the problem?”
“Because I’m always going to need you more than you need me.” His gaze roamed my face, as if he believed our time was coming to an end and he had to absorb every detail. “Please don’t think I’m being self-deprecating. I’m just stating the truth. I have depression, Indy. I’ve had it since I was a kid—you know that. And it’s not going away. There’s no cure. I’ll probably be on medication for the rest of my life. And I’m okay with that.” His fingers skimmed my jaw, tender affection there. “But I’m a burden. Almost every single day one of my brothers checks in to make sure I’m okay, and that’s because they’ve watched me not be able to pick myself up . . . And you’re always going to put me ahead of you. You did it before and you’ll do it again. Maybe that would be okay if I gave you something in return, but I have nothing to offer you. I already drained the life out of you once before. I refuse to do it again. You deserve so much more.”
It would’ve hurt less if Nolan had told me he didn’t love me.
He was right. Nolan hadn’t confirmed it until this moment, and I might’ve not known the term for it until I was older—but I’d known he had depression. Knew the silent weight he carried. He hadn’t hidden that side from me. But that hadn’t stopped me from falling in love with him. Even before now, when he’d told me he’d been in therapy and was on medication, I didn’t think anything of it. It didn’t matter to me. Not because I didn’t care, but because it didn’t change who he was.
This was why he hadn’t pressed for more, had accepted it when I told him I couldn’t give him more than a month. Why he hadn’t asked me to stay. Why he’d pushed for us to go our separate ways all those years ago. Even why he broke our promise and asked for a divorce.
He truly believed he deserved to be left.
Eyes burning, I cupped his jaw in my hands. “I think you forget: I didn’t fall in love with the boy on the baseball field, playing under the bright lights.” I pressed my forehead to his, praying he’d see how much he was worth. How much he’d always been worth. “I fell in love with the boy I found in the dark.”
Chapter Fifty-Four
Indy—Then: Age Fifteen
Bethany Turner could kiss my grounded ass.
Not only had Mom taken my DVD of Dirty Dancing—the limited keepsake edition—she’d taken the Patrick Swayze poster off my wall. For two weeks, I wasn’t allowed to leave the house except for school or to waste away scrubbing crusty food off the diner tables.
And apparently to help search for the town’s missing golden boy.
Flashlight in hand, I stomped deeper into the woods behind my house. Mom and Dad had gone to join the rest of the search party, searching through the forest surrounding the Graham house. I’d been content to stay home and sulk, but Mom had asked me to do a quick sweep through our backyard.
She’d told me not to leave the yard, but after confirming there wasn’t a boy hiding in the chicken coop, I opened the back gate and stepped past the tree line. I might as well enjoy my freedom while I could, even if it was for something as pointless as this.
Nolan Graham wasn’t missing.
This hick town had a knack for taking the tiniest bit of information and blowing it out of proportion. Sheriff Turner had done the same thing to me, fining my parents because I’d “broken” two stop signs by throwing watermelons at them while driving down the highway. They weren’t broken. Dented, yes, but they stood just fine. And Nolan was fine too.
He was probably with his friends, shitting himself silly for turning the whole town into a frenzy. I wouldn’t be surprised if he’d snuck off to make out with some girl, one of the many who drooled over his superstar baseball skills. Gross. If I found Nolan pressed against some tree with his tongue down Bethany’s throat, I’d throw a watermelon at my own head.
A mist of rain filtered through the treetops, light enough I could still see but heavy enough I regretted not listening to Dad and grabbing my coat. My boot slipped, and I hit the ground with a smack, water seeping through my jeans. I gritted my teeth, wiping the leaves and pine needles off my hands and knees as I stood.
Why was I out here? Sure, I’d known Nolan since before kindergarten. He was constantly pulling my hair and stealing all the marshmallows from the baggy of Lucky Charms I brought to school every day. We were both freshmen, even ran in the same crowd occasionally, but we weren’t friends. We didn’t talk. He was too busy schmoozing everyone with his baby blue eyes, pretty smile, and how fast he could throw a baseball.
Fine, he was okay at baseball. It was his freshman year, and he’d led the baseball team to the state playoffs. They’d lost, but it was the school’s first time there in twenty years, and he was all anyone could talk about. I would’ve told someone to buzz off the moment they tried telling me what college I should sign with, but Nolan didn’t seem to mind.
Mom had told me I stirred up trouble because I was bored, claiming if I had some sort of hobby, I wouldn’t feel the need to vandalize stop signs or break curfew on Friday nights. I’d told her I wasn’t bored, I was having fun. To which she’d said, “Look at the Graham boy. You don’t see him getting in trouble, do you? It’s because he’s focused. He has an end goal.”
I hadn’t bothered to point out that Nolan had bought the watermelons.
Frustrated, I scooped the flashlight off the ground and started home. It was overcast and dark, and I couldn’t see the porch light from here, but I knew these woods like the back of my hand. Nolan was on his own. If he wanted to run away from Wallowpine, that was his right. Lord knew I was behind him.
I was halfway home, wondering where Mom had hidden my favorite movie, when something moved in the corner of my vision. Please don’t be a bear or a skunk. Oh hell, I think I’d prefer a bear. But when I flicked the light to the right and realized who was there, I would’ve been happy with either.
“Nolan?” I squinted, making no move to approach the figure crouched in the grove of trees not twenty feet from me. Golden strands peeked out beneath a baseball cap. It was him, all right. “What are you doing?”
He didn’t respond. Asshole.
Teeth chattering and pissed off, I strode toward him. “Okay, you had your fun—it’s time to go home.” I stopped a few steps short of where he sat on the forest floor, seeing red when he didn’t so much as look up at me. “Seriously, joke’s over. You scared the whole town. You should’ve seen your dad, your little brother—”
I fell silent, realizing Nolan wasn’t reacting. Not to my shouting, nor the branches creaking above us. He sat on his bottom with his legs curled to his chest, his back rising with heavy breaths. I knelt, fingers dipping into the soil as I dropped to his level.
His back was to an aspen tree, the white bark stark even in the night. His shoulders were tight, hands clenched. His breaths were shallow, like he couldn’t get enough air. His gaze was distant, unfocused. It wasn’t the same, but it reminded me of the look I’d see Dad sometimes get after his time in the military.
For the first time in his life, the golden boy didn’t look so . . . golden.
“Nolan.” My voice was cautious, easy. A mirror to how I’d heard Mom talk to Dad sometimes. “It’s Indy Tyler. I’m going to grab your hand, okay?” Pretending I wasn’t about to hold a boy’s hand for the first time, I carefully lifted one of his hands and wrapped it with mine. “Well, lookie there—we’re like two peas in a pod.” His breaths were shaky, but I assumed by the way he held my fingers, my touch hadn’t distressed him more. “Are you hurt?”
His grip tightened, his voice so throaty and low I almost didn’t hear him say, “I think I’m having a heart attack.”
My stomach dropped, not because I thought he was having a heart attack, but because I smelled a waft of liquor on his breath. “You’re not having a heart attack,” I whispered as his breaths quickened. “But you’re going to pass out if you don’t slow your breathing.”
He let out a low groan and rubbed at his chest with his free hand, as though trying to let something out. He was panicking. His breaths sped up, and the more I smelled the sure sign of alcohol, the more I thought I should get help. But Mom and Dad had taken away my phone, and I couldn’t just leave him here alone.
I grabbed his hand from his chest, squeezing his fingers. “Nolan, I don’t know where your mind is, but you’re with me. And I need you to slow your breaths.” I squirmed my way between his knees and knelt between his legs. “I know it’s hard, but you can do it—try and tell me three things you see. I’ll do it with you, okay?”
I scanned our surroundings, not knowing what the heckin’ bob I was doing. I’d seen Mom do this exercise with Dad to help ground him when his mind felt far, but I was butchering it. After telling him I saw a flashlight, pine needles, and a tree—it was dark, my options were limited, okay—I expected Nolan not to respond, but on a quiet pull of air, he gasped, “Stick, rock, freckles.”
I nodded. “Good—now three sounds you hear.”
He clamped his eyes shut, his shoulders shuddering. “Branches creaking. Rain falling. Peaches.”
I furrowed my brows—peaches? Where had that come from? Deciding it wasn’t worth pointing out there were no peaches to be seen or heard, I said, “I’m going to let your hands go . . . and I want you to move three body parts.”
I scooted back, the tips of his fingers grazing my palm as I slid them out of his hold. His arms hung at his sides, his breaths slower than when I’d first stumbled upon him. He lifted his arm and reached back, smoothing his hand on the aspen behind him. He raised his shoulders, then stretched his legs in and out.
I settled back onto my knees, helpless. I should get help. At least run to the house and see if my parents were home. But when Nolan closed his eyes and leaned his head back against the tree, I couldn’t make myself leave. I’d never seen him this way.
He looked . . . defeated.
I shivered, wrapping my arms around myself as a breeze blew through the trees, rain pelting my skin. “We should go.”
“No.” It sounded like a plea. “Not yet.”
I chewed on my lip, unsure. I didn’t want to force him, but we couldn’t stay here forever. “If you want, you can wait here, and I’ll go find your dad—”
“No. He has enough to worry about.”
I made a face. “You’ve been missing for five hours—I think he’s worried already.”
“I can’t deal with this right now.” He groaned, rubbing his palms against his eyes. “This is gonna kill Dad.”
“Well, we can’t stay out here,” I told him. The rain was picking up, and it was only a matter of time before someone found us—him. It didn’t matter if I’d found Nolan; my parents were going to flip their lid when they realized I’d left the house. But they hadn’t seen what I had, hadn’t felt his panicked breaths. “You can come to my house if you want. Just for a little bit.”
There was a boy in my room.
I teetered on my heels, lingering in the doorway of my bedroom. Nolan stood on the opposite side, looking as wary as I felt. His mouth was flat, his shoulders curled in, and his hands were shoved in the pockets of his soggy jeans. After changing into a fresh sweater and leggings, I’d thought about offering him something dry to wear, but I doubted anything of mine would fit him, and I wasn’t about to raid Dad’s clothes. My parents were still gone, but I’d taken a risk bringing Nolan here. I doubted Auburn would’ve snitched, but luckily she was out of town with friends anyway.
When I offered my house as a hiding spot, I never thought he’d accept. Figured he’d decline and make me suffer in the rain until I caught hypothermia. But he’d accepted without a thought, like a lost puppy who’d found a home.
I’d always been more of a cat person . . . but he’d do.
Endless generosity pouring out of me, I closed the distance between us. “Eat.” I shoved a bowl of cereal into his hands.
I struggled not to squirm beneath his gaze, slowly looking between me and the Lucky Charms. “Where are the little marshmallows?” He shook the bowl lightly, as though the colorful shapes would magically appear. “Did you eat them all?”
I scowled. My socks were soggy thanks to the water seeping out of his jeans—and he had the nerve to complain? “It’s my favorite cereal. I can share it with you however I want.”
“You don’t even like the marshmallows.”
“I love them! What kind of monster doesn’t?”
“Then how come I only see you eat the little oat pieces?” He plopped down in the chair at my desk, apparently content to stay. “You’re always picking those out first and leaving the marshmallows behind.”
How did he even know that? “I was saving the best part for last. But I never get to eat them because you’re always stealing them—”
“Because I thought you didn’t like them.” He was such a liar—he knew I loved them. The first time he’d stolen them I threatened to break his hand. “You can’t fault me for doing a beautiful girl a favor.”
I ground my teeth, wanting nothing more than to dump the bowl onto his head and wipe the grin off his face, even more so when he winked. This was the Nolan Graham I knew—not the exhausted version I’d found tonight. Empty, flirty words and bedazzling smiles, always ready to put on a show—
