Page 33 of Left of Forever

To my deep disappointment, it is nothing like the first time I dropped him off at preschool, when I had to peel his small body off mine and pass him to his teacher. When I heard him crying out for me all the way to my car, silent tears running in rivulets down my cheeks. It’s not like the time Ellis and I dropped him off for his first day of middle school, either, back when Sam had been at his most awkward and Ellis and I had been at our very worst. Sam clearly found our lingering mortifying, but when he tried to shoo us away with an urgent “GO!” his voice had broken like sneakers on a gym floor. Ellis and I couldn’t help but laugh whenhe walked away. It’d been one of the last times we’d laughed together when we were married, I think.

Instead, I clap a palm over my own mouth to cry into when I exit the building and power walk to Ellis’s truck. I’m stupidly grateful when I get to it and see that he’s had the forethought to leave it unlocked.

I hope Ellis is keeping it together better than I am, hope he’s having a refresher conversation with him about staying safe. About drinking and sex and coming home anytime he needs to. How we will love him no matter what and welcome him home with open arms even if he wants to change course. God, what if Sam’s actually nervous or scared and I just tore off in a storm of my own feelings and left him stranded? Did I just make this all about me? Shit.

Ellis emerges from the apartment building, pausing outside the glass doors for a moment with his big hands bracketing his hips before he brings them back up, drags both palms down his face, and marches for the truck.

The closer he gets, the more aware I become, too. I realize I haven’t been inside this truck… ever. He bought it a year and a half ago or so, when Silas told me his old one bit the dust. Still, it smells like him in an overwhelming way. Something that kicks up an old, full-body response. I’m a Heinz 57 bottle of emotion, upside down and shaken, waiting for the inevitable plop.

A fresh wave of his scent hits me tenfold when Ellis opens his door and slides into the driver’s side. He gives me a wavering look from behind his sunglasses, and my chin wobbles anew.

“I’m not doing great at all,” he says, his voice a husk of itself.

The admission is so plain, so unlike his normal, solid-to-the-point-of-reticence demeanor, that I immediately devolve into a fit of cry-cackling.

His laugh joins mine, and through my tears, I see him wipe at his own.

“Fuck, how is this happening already?” he asks with an airy laugh. “I just watched them cut him out of you. Hejustlearned to walk.”

“I just taught him to pee in a toilet using Cheerios for target practice,” I say.

“I just had a talk with him about long showers and body odor.”

“You taught him to drive yesterday!”

His expression turns apologetic. “I just ran into him buying condoms over in Yoos Bay because he was too scared to get caught around Spunes.”

I gasp. “You’re kidding! When?”

He shakes his head. “Like two years ago.”

I groan and wince. I knew it was probably happening, but this revelation only confirms that everything has gone by in a blink without me noticing it.

Ellis and I fall quiet after that. Like we tossed all those memories up in the air, bending and twisting time between us until it’s left us dizzy and disoriented.

“You up for another two-and-a-half-hour stretch?” he gently asks. “Unless you want me to find us somewhere here to stay?”

The gravity of what we’re about to embark on settles over me. “If you’re up for driving, I’m fine. I worry that staying too close will make me want to come snatch him back,” I say with a tired laugh. “But… can we just drive? I’m not ready to talk. Yet.” No matter how long it’s been, the foolish chemicals in my body are predisposed to feel safe with this man, and all I’d like to do now is sleep.

He looks relieved. “Yeah. Of course,” he says. His smile flickersshyly, and I remind myself that even though this trip was his idea, he’s likely nervous, too. “You want to sync your music to the speaker?” he asks.

“Sure.”

I put on one of my favorite calm café stations full of acoustic covers and deconstructed beats. The music and the summer sunset shine through my window and work their magic over me quickly. I relax into the leather seat, eyelids heavy.

“Where we headed first, again?” I ask, the words coming out in a slow drawl as I rock closer to sleep.

“I thought we’d go to the beach.”

CHAPTER 16

WREN

It’s past dark when Ellis rouses me in the parking lot of the Dream Inn in Santa Cruz. I’m too groggy to feel much beyond the allure of getting into a bed, so I climb down from the truck on wooden limbs and don’t fight Ellis when he slings two of my three bags over his shoulders, leaving me with one rolling suitcase to trawl along at my heels.

We check into our separate, adjacent rooms, then spend the short elevator ride up to the fourth floor in silence.

“Should we call Sam and let him know we made it to our hotel?” I ask when we hit our floor.