Running Back (New York Leopards 2)

He pressed his lips together. “You’re not being fair.”

I sighed. “I know. I’m sorry.”

We were silent until the hill crested and the land fell away before us. To the west, the water stretched out, a flat blue under bright sky, while a mile in the distance a tiny village lay nestled between two hills, a patchwork of pastel houses with slate-gray roofs. Beyond it, the hills climbed again, brushed with green grasses and black stone dotted with purple.

Before the village, midway down the hill, a church rose up, the Gothic steeple perfectly piercing the sky. Moss covered the roof of an ancillary building. It looked so surreally perfect that my heart ached and my feet stopped.

Mike must have been paying attention, because he turned impatiently. “Aren’t you coming?”

“It’s beautiful.”

He grinned. “Kind of like the fields were beautiful? You’d probably find something good to say about the subway.”

I made a face at him. “And you’d probably say Rome is just a pile of rocks.”

He laughed. “I’m not that bad.”

We reached the church. Cypress trees stood before it, their branches curved tightly up toward the sky like they had been cultivated, while apple trees formed looser circles, blue peeking in between the leaves. Everything felt still and quiet as we curved around the old building. A tidy graveyard spread down the hill, while manicured grasses framed plots and placards.

“Oh, look.” At the back of the cemetery, by swooping, draping trees, a Celtic cross stood alone. I cut through the graves, fixed on the marker. Beneath the dark green moss, the stone was worn and dark, smoothed by age and pitted by weather.

“Natalie, I don’t think—”

I crouched down and tried to make out the year. 1158. I reached out and then hesitated, my fingertips centimeters from the stone. The instruction not to touch art hovered between me and the cross.

But with living history, maybe it was meant to be part of our world. My fingers landed on the stone, cold even after an afternoon soaking up the sun. I could feel the aerated bubbles of rock as I brushed my fingers over the surface. “Look at this. Eight hundred years old. Eight hundred years old. And just sitting in a village graveyard, of no note, no record, just...here.” I shook my head. “It’s amazing.”

My fingers traced the carvings, the Celtic knots, etchings that had been chipped out eight centuries before I was born. This was the direct work of some nameless artisan. That’s what always got me. How very close I was with this unknown person. How very far away.

So many people, lost to obscurity. So many stories I could bring back.

It took me a while to notice the silence. I got lost easily, tangled in thoughts and time and other worlds. Usually someone called my name or touched my shoulder to get my attention, but this time Mike’s silence outgrew my own, and I turned to see him standing across the small graveyard, silent as the stone saint behind him.

He didn’t move as I came up by his side. I followed his gaze to the stones he studied so carefully.

Martin O’Connor. Ellen O’Connor. Kathleen O’Connor. Mary O’Connor. Sean O’Connor.

I swallowed over the sudden lump. “You okay?”

He shrugged. “It’s not like they were real to me. I mean—”

“I know.”

He nodded. “But it’s sort of funny—all of their names written out. And—” He nodded at the newest-looking stone, still sharp cornered and smooth.

Patrick O’Connor.

The bottom of my stomach fell out. “Ah.”

“And then—it’s like no one else ever left. I feel— Would my dad have wanted to be here? Should he have been?”

I didn’t know what to say or do. I wanted to comfort him, but wasn’t sure how. I reached down and laced my fingers through his, and stepped sideways until our arms lined up against each other.

He squeezed my hand, and we stood there, staring at the O’Connors.

“What happened to your dad?”

The tension seemed to drain out of Mike’s body, and he leaned slightly into me. “Car crash. The other driver was drunk.”