Travis (Pelion Lake 1)

She fiddled with her bracelets, two spots of color appearing on her cheeks as her eyes narrowed. She was gathering her anger. And her anger was a shield, I supposed, but it also shot daggers. It was meant to protect . . . and to wound. And I had never been exempt from it. What happened to you? I wanted to ask. But it didn’t matter. She was never going to change. She’d had opportunities to become better—to reinvent herself—and she’d never taken them. “He didn’t even want you!” Her words fired out. “You should have seen his face when I told him I was pregnant! It was like someone had punched him square in the gut.”

“Because you tricked him into it!” I yelled, and drew satisfaction from her flinch. I knew what it was like to be strapped to this woman, so I didn’t have to wonder how he’d felt. He’d made mistakes too, but he’d tried to do the honorable thing. And I wasn’t going to let my selfish mother convince me that, though I was unplanned, he didn’t love me. My heart told me differently. I’d felt his love. And believing he’d loved me and then left anyway had created a deep pit of devastation inside, one I’d carried since I was a child. I wasn’t going to carry it any longer. I took a deep, cleansing breath, blowing out the anger, the resentment. I wasn’t going to hold on to that either and risk turning into her. “I burned those amendments you gave me,” I said. Except one. But I wasn’t going to tell her that.

Her eyes widened, lips twisting. “You did what? My God! I thought I could trust you by giving you the originals! Do you know what you’ve lost? Do you even know?”

“No, you’re the one who lost, Mom.” I took her in, one final time. “If you’d loved me at all, you would have given me this letter,” I said, holding it up again. “You were so unwilling to let go of trying to control everything and everyone, that you lost. You lost it all. Including me.”

And then I turned and walked away.

As the road back to Pelion—back home—stretched before me, her words echoed.

I thought I could trust you, she’d said.

You can’t, I thought.

But maybe I can finally start trusting myself.

**********

I made a few other quick stops, notably one to the firehouse where I had some explaining to do, and a favor to ask, and then I headed home.

It was strange being in my house again, surrounded by all the things that felt both familiar and not. It didn’t feel like home anymore. Not the way The Yellow Trellis Inn had, that house full of misfits and laughter. Affection, and even love.

And it went without saying, plenty of hooch.

I took a seat at my dining table, pushing a letter from my landlady aside. I’d deal with that later. My computer sat in front of me, and for a few minutes I simply stared out the window at the trees that blocked the lake beyond. There wasn’t a clear lake view from here, but I could see tiny sparkles of blue through the feathery branches, and feel the peace that the water brought. How many countless times had that lake comforted me? Too many to count. How many times had the people in this community comforted me, in one way or another? Far too many to count.

I thought about what Burt had told me about Betty, and about her lost words. I thought about how they completed each other, each providing what the other was missing.

I thought about Haven, and about Easton too.

I thought about how they were nomads, searching for a home.

And how I was a man with a home I’d never fully appreciated until I saw it through their eyes.

I felt ashamed, and grateful, and devastated, and humbled.

I let it all fall over me, soaking into my skin, filling my heart, weaving into the fiber of my bones, who I was and who I might become. Who my father believed I would be.

Listen to your wise and tender heart.

I thought about all the ways I’d taken the multitude of gifts I’d been given for granted, abandoning all faith and embracing the very worst parts of myself.

And I no longer wanted to be that man.

I wanted to be someone better.

I slipped on my reading glasses, opened a document, and began to type.

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

Travis

“Thank you all for coming to, uh, the follow-up to the town meeting,” I said, the microphone giving out an ear-piercing shriek that traveled along my already-frayed nerves as I winced, leaning back slightly. I cleared my throat. “I know this is irregular, and I appreciate you all making time to be here. Again.”

I bent, lifting a box of stapled packets at my feet and handing it to Deb. She took it with a small huff, staggering slightly under its weight. I leaned away from the microphone. “There’s a dolly over there,” I whispered, inclining my head.