I picked up a random one and read about a day in her life back then. It’d all been so simple—calculus, running, report cards, friends, animals, the start and end of summer. The letter was upbeat, and I realized in retrospect, she’d hidden her suffering to make my time inside a little easier. One part caught my attention.
* * *
Whenever I mess something up, I think about what you said at camp when I didn’t want to ride the horse. I asked what would happen if I fell, and you said I’d get up and dust myself off. After you and I rode together, I felt like I could do it on my own. Not that I wanted to, but that I could. I think one day when I have kids, I’ll take them horseback riding and teach them the same thing. I know it’s cliché and there’s already a saying about getting back on the horse when you fall off, but it’s so true, isn’t it? It’s a good lesson.
* * *
I gritted my teeth and drank more. Lake had been so lovely, so naïve. Had I sucked it all out of her, just by loving her? After all these letters with no response, after watching me marry her sister, after probably taking a pill to make sure she’d never have my baby, was she still hopeful? Did she let herself love Corbin as completely as she’d loved me?
An ache radiated through my chest. Surely words written on a page could not cause this kind of pain. I must’ve been having a heart attack. I sat forward and put my head in my hands. This was why I couldn’t read the letters in prison. My mind spun out wherever Lake was involved. I knew I should never read another word. If there was any chance Lake had moved on and left me behind, I needed to turn these letters into kindling instead of keeping them to torture myself.
Against my better judgement, I kept reading, consuming all her thoughts and desires and hopes and dreams. But as I did, I realized that I already knew the truth. It was as plain and simple in these letters as it had been the first day I’d talked to Lake. She’d never asked for much. Unlike her sister, Lake didn’t need expensive things or the best home in the neighborhood or a new car to mark every big accomplishment.
Lake would’ve been happy just to have me.
Despite everything, hope still burned in me for us. Lake deserved that much from me.
5
Manning
A couple months after I’d read Lake’s letters, I had visitors. Henry was the most dependable man I knew. By having my back during my sister’s death, when my parents had tried pinning everything on me, he’d saved me, a helpless teenager, from what could’ve been a shit life. And with all the tragedy he’d encountered as a police officer, it would’ve been easy for him to send me on my way afterward. Instead, he continued to check in on me, making sure I finished high school despite my situation.
The furniture business was booming, and I didn’t trust many people to help me out, but I had a particularly important rush order and needed a hand. Having retired, Henry had been able to come up and stay at the house for a few weeks to help me get the workload under control.
This was his last night in Big Bear, so I picked up some barbeque for the occasion. Since it was the same week Young Cubs Sleepaway Camp was in session up the hill, and Gary was still the director, I invited him and his wife Lydia over for dinner.
Even though it was August, the nights in Big Bear could get chilly. I built a fire in the pit in the front yard and welcomed the closest friends I had with a cooler of beer on ice.
“You’re in a good mood,” Gary said, walking up the drive to shake my hand.
I nodded at Henry, who was prepping the grill. “Henry and I have been working around the clock the past couple weeks. Feels good to do nothing but build furniture day in and day out, but I’m also glad this project is done.”
“So business is good?” he asked.
“Too good. Any time this week you need a break from the chaos up there at camp, I can put you to work.”
Lydia hobbled up the gravel in heels, holding her purse strap to one shoulder and balancing a paper grocery bag in the other. Just like Tiffany, the woman was always wearing something akin to stilts. Always had her brown hair styled, her makeup done. No wonder they’d gotten along so well. “Do you have a website?” she asked, frowning when I shook my head. “You need one. Everyone has them these days.”