She doesn’t laugh at my joke either. “I want to know why you see things the way you do. Why do you insist on being so damn lonely?”
“I get why you think that I push everyone away, and maybe that’s how I come across, but that’s never my intention.”
Her eyes are pleading, desperate for any crumb I’m willing to throw her way. “Help me understand.”
I place my hand on the top rail and look out at the pasture. The stables are always quiet, not only during the off weeks. I find peace while spending time with the horses—exercising them, grooming them, and letting them free to graze in the pasture. But it’s not where I’d choose to spend my days if my brothers and I had executed our childhood plan.
“You know how much I love this camp, but it wasn’t just me who loved this place years ago. My brothers and I had a dream, a plan. And it all felt so perfect. We were all so different, yet our passion felt like glue when we’d come together and map what we saw in this place.”
“Different how?”
“I was the creator of us all, for sure. I think that’s why I was able to draw up the visions we all had for this place and attempt to bring it to life. And it’s why I love woodworking.”
Hope smiles and nods. “Yeah, I can see that.”
“While Jamison,” I continue, “was the analytical one. He had so many logical ideas on how to increase profit margins and all that shit. In our dream world, he was supposed to make all the financial decisions for the camp. That’s not my area of expertise. Hence why I almost fucked everything up and drove this place into the ground after he left.”
“You’re too hard on yourself,” she says softly. “What’s Jamison doing now?”
“He started his own gig as a financial analyst for a bunch of corporate companies in Seattle, and it’s absolutely fitting.” I roll my eyes to the sky when I think about Jamison in his expensive suit sitting in his high-rise Seattle building. The complete opposite of life here. Perhaps that’s why it stung so badly when I found out Hope wanted to move to Seattle. It felt like rejection all over again.
“And your other brothers?”
“Cayson was the explorer, always sneaking off into the woods and doing some crazy stunts on the boat. He’s a pilot in the Air Force now, living his biggest dream. But it was Benson who was always the horse whisperer.” I nod out at the pasture. “He learned to ride before he could even walk, and as he grew older, he was an all-star at the Bexley family rodeos we used to put on. I always joked that he would have lived in the barn if my parents had let him. No one argued. And no one tended to the herd like he did. He loved those horses like they were family. Hell, he might have loved them even more than our family.”
Hope frowns. “I don’t get it. It sounds like everyone loved it here so much. They must miss it.”
The way she gazes up at me, so hopeful, is yet another reminder of just how much I’ve missed her all these months. She’s the only one who has ever made me feel as if the way things are now doesn’t have to be the way it ends. There’s still a chance. “I don’t know how they could miss something that burnt to the ground the way it did.”
“Because of your dad?”
I suck in a deep breath and blow it out slowly. “Yes and no. My dad was only trying to cope like the rest of us. But his method of coping was to go harder on all of us, like he was trying to toughen us up so that we could withstand pain like the one we suffered through.”
Hope frowns. “What happened?”
Her voice is so gentle, filled with a level of concern I don’t deserve. The darkness in my head swells like a fog, clouding my thoughts like it does every time I think of what I’d lost. What we’d all lost.
“Twelve years ago was a happier time—when there were five of us brothers, not four.”
“What?” Hope asks, surprised. “But you and Silver never mentioned anyone else.” It’s like the realization is setting in while she’s talking.
I swallow back the pain of our family’s tragic past. “Silver came along two years later. By then, we felt like not saying a whole lot was the way to move past it, so she didn’t know much. Just that Tyson was Benny’s twin.”
Everything goes quiet, and I have to look away from Hope in order to get the words out. I’ve never told anyone this story before. “Benny and Ty.” I smile at hearing myself say their names. “They were fifteen, and I was twenty-four, working at the camp full time. Jamison was nineteen, and following in my footsteps, and Cayson was thirteen.” I take another breath, trying to give myself a mental pep talk to rip off the bandage. “Dad was on Benson’s ass one day about helping out more instead of riding all damn day. Benny was so upset about it. He, more than any of us, hated disappointing our dad. He came to me and asked if he could skip school so he could make up for some of the work he’d gotten behind on, and I didn’t have the heart to tell him no. And of course, when Benny skipped school, Ty had to skip too. They were attached at the hip, those two. When one did something, the other had to follow. We all had a tight bond, but those two had something extra special.”
Jesus, this is hard. My throat feels tight with my next swallow, so I take another minute to collect myself. “It was my responsibility to make sure they got their asses to school every day because mom’s nurse job started too early and dad was always too deep into his work to focus on the younger boys. So, when dinner time came around and the boys still weren’t back, I went to the stables to look for them. They were nowhere to be found, and their horses were missing.”
Hope sucks in a breath and grips my hand. “Oh no.”
I shake my head and kick my toe into the dirt. “Nah, I was livid and swore that as soon as I found those boys, I was going to knock them both to the ground. I vowed to never let them skip school again. In the two hours I spent looking for them in the dark, I made a list of all the chores they’d have to do for the next month to make it up to me. But when I found them, Ty was already gone.”
Hope squeezes my hand. “No.”
“Worst day of my life.” I dart a glance at Hope, whose eyes are red and glistening with unshed tears. I’d cry myself if my tears weren’t lodged somewhere between my chest and my throat.
“What happened to him?”
It doesn’t feel like she’s prying when she asks, and I appreciate that she gives me time to answer. “Ty’s horse got spooked by a deer. He got thrown and—I’ll save you the gory details, but nothing I did brought him back. And it was all my fault.”
Hope’s mouth opens, and she shakes her head as a tear slips down her cheek. “What? No, Anderson. How could you possibly think that? It was a horrific accident, but you’re not to blame.”
A sarcastic chuckle creeps up the back of my throat. “That’s where you’re wrong. I was the oldest. I was responsible for Ty and Benny not getting to school. I should have told Benny no and dragged their asses there, and we’d all still be here today.”
My chest feels battered from the emotional punches I deliver every time I remotely think about the events of that day. But everything that unfolded after almost feels worse. We were broken. Our family destroyed. And I’m still here, still trying to fix the mess I brought on us all.