Page 111 of Inseparable
She shakes her head. “Don’t be. I don’t want you hiding your past from me. I just hate that you had to go through all that alone.”
I look around the table at familiar faces, and I’m choked with emotion. Devin links his fingers through mine, and I cling to his touch. “I’m not alone anymore, and it feels so good to be back home.”
“It’s good to have you home,” Jon says, wrapping his arm around Mom. “The place has felt empty without you.” I smile warmly at him. He turns to Mom, and there’s a hopeful glint in his eye. “Maybe now your mother will finally agree to set a date.” I arch a brow. “When she accepted my proposal of marriage, it was on condition that the wedding would only take place once you were home to give her away.”
My heart aches again, but I smile expansively, determined I’m shedding no more tears. “Well, I’m back for good, so I think it’s time you honored your promise, Mom, and I would be so proud to give you away.”
After dinner, Dev and I take a stroll out in the woods. I’ve been dying to see the treehouse he built with Danny. “Is it hard being back?” he asks, swinging our conjoined hands between us as we walk.
“Yes and no. On one level, it’s comforting, and I’m so happy to see Mom happy, but all the changes remind me of how much I missed, and the memories aren’t always good ones.”
“I know what you mean,” he says.
I’ve never doubted the connection between Devin and me, but we’re in sync on so many different levels now. “But I can’t dwell on the what-ifs anymore or allow the guilt to waylay me. Every step I take is a step forward, and I have to let go of the past. I made bad choices, choices which hurt me and those I love, but I can’t change that. I can just ensure I make better choices, the right choices, moving forward.”
He lifts our conjoined hands to his mouth, pressing a soft kiss on the back of my cold skin. “There she is,” he whispers, moisture building in his eyes. “There’s the girl I fell in love with as a kid.”
I pull him to a stop. “I’m still me. I might have lost my way for a while, and I’m undoubtedly changed, but underneath it all, I’m still the same girl who has adored you for most of her life.”
He draws me into his arms, and I willingly go there. Everything has always felt right with the world when I’m wrapped up in Devin’s embrace, never more so than now. Everything is going to work out. I say it in my head, and, for the first time, I really, truly believe it.
“Oh my God, Devin. You built that?” I ask, looking up at the beautiful glass and cherry pine wooden structure nestled between two trees. Calling it a treehouse seems like an insult. It has a proper roof and windows and a sturdy ladder.
“Come on,” he pulls me forward excitedly. “Let’s go up.”
We have to dip our heads when we reach the top even though the space is taller, wider, and longer than the treehouse we used to play in as kids. Comfy bean bags litter the floor, and we drop down onto them. Devin pulls a blanket out of a box in the corner of the space, covering us fully.
My eyes drink in my surroundings, tearing up as I note all the personal touches. The wall is covered in drawings and photos of us as kids. The framed photo that used to sit on my bedside table, the one of the three of us holding the walleye fish, is tacked to the wall. A small fish tank sits on the sturdy shelf alongside books and games. Two goldfish swim lazily through the hazy water, and emotion clogs the back of my throat. “Best to keep me away from those,” I laugh, remembering the time I overfed the fish and came back the next day to find all three of them bloated and floating at the top of the tank. I’d cried my eyes out for three days solid.
“You were only nine, and you didn’t know both me and Ayd had already fed them. I think they’re safe in your hands now.”
“Are those our actual old games?” I ask, kneeling up to inspect the faded boxes on the shelf beside the tank.
He nods. “Your mom had them all in the attic.”
Of course, she did. She’s a hoarder, especially when it was anything to do with me. I knew she kept a big trunk in the attic crammed full of my old school reports, drawings, ballet certificates, and other childhood memorabilia.
My eyes latch on the other framed item on the wall, and I stop breathing. The memory regurgitates in my mind as if it was only yesterday. I scoot closer, reaching out to skim my fingers across the glass, examining our childish signatures, and the faded blood. “You found it,” I whisper.
He kneels up beside me. “I kept it all these years. Guess, somewhere deep down inside, I still believed in our pact.”
“I always believed in it. Up until Ayden died.”
We are both silent, lost in our own thoughts as we stare at it.
“So, do you like it?” he asks, a few minutes later, breaking the silence.
I grin at him. “I love it. It’s perfect.”
His answering smile almost knocks the air out of my lungs. “I came up here every time I visited your mom. It helped me feel closer to you. To both of you.”
My heart aches in a familiar way. Ayden should be here with us, and I hate that he isn’t, but thoughts of our lost friend doesn’t dredge up the same conflicted feelings. Letting go of my anger and guilt is allowing me to properly mourn him for the first time. And to fully appreciate my other friend—this man at my side, the one who has stuck by me through thick and thin, who pulled me back from the brink when I was ready to throw in the towel. I peer into his eyes. “I love you, Devin. I love you so much.”
“I love you too.”
We stare at one another, and a customary, electrical current charges the tiny space between us. We lean toward one another at the same time. When our lips meet, I feel a sense of deep contentment that has eluded me for years. He pulls me in to his arms, and the kiss deepens, strengthens, infused with years of longing. It’s not frantic, or wild, or the result of pent-up sexual frustration—which I’m sure he feels as much as I do—but tender and loving and full of unspoken promise. When we finally break the kiss, we stay wrapped around one another, silently holding onto each other without the need to say anything.
We’re walking back to the house, hand in hand, when someone steps out in front of us on the path. “Lina.” Nancy Carter’s eyes well up. “Your mom told me you were home. I’m glad. She’s missed you terribly.” Shoving her hands in her coat pocket, she shuffles nervously on her feet. “I was hoping you might have a few minutes to talk.”
