Chương 7
That was one of the things he was beginning to notice about her.
She did not rush to fill empty spaces.
She let people sit with things.
Emma walked into the room and sat on the couch.
“Lily, why don’t you get ready for bed?”
“It’s not bedtime.”
“It is close.”
“You said that twenty minutes ago.”
“I know.”
“Then it still counts.”
Emma sighed.
Jax looked at her.
A small smile appeared.
“What?”
“She argues like you.”
Emma pointed at Lily.
“That is exactly what I was afraid of.”
Lily grinned.
“I heard that.”
“I meant you to.”
The normal exchange almost made Jax forget the impossible part.
Almost.
Lily disappeared upstairs.
The house became quieter.
Jax stood near the bookshelf, looking at photographs.
He tried not to.
That was the problem.
Trying not to notice made him notice everything.
Lily at a school event.
Lily missing teeth.
Lily holding a fishbowl.
Lily sitting beside Emma on a hospital waiting room chair.
That one made him stop.
Emma saw.
“It was nothing serious.”
“When?”
“Last year.”
“What happened?”
“I fainted.”
Jax turned around.
“You fainted?”
“I was dehydrated.”
“You were alone?”
“No.”
“Emma.”
She looked tired.
“I was not alone.”
“Who was there?”
“My neighbor.”
The answer bothered him.
Not because the neighbor had done something wrong.
Because a stranger had been there for something important.
A stranger had known she needed help.
And he had been somewhere else.
Riding.
Working.
Avoiding.
“You should have told me.”
Emma looked at him.
“And then what?”
He stopped.
The question was not cruel.
It was practical.
What would he have done?
Showed up?
Stayed?
Would he have stayed?
That was the question he hated.
“I don’t know.”
“I know.”
The words were quiet.
“You would have come.”
Jax looked surprised.
“But you would have left after you convinced yourself I was okay.”
He did not answer.
Because he could not.
Emma walked to the kitchen and poured water into a glass.
“You were always good at emergencies.”
Jax looked at her.
“But?”
“You were not good at ordinary days.”
The sentence stayed with him.
It was not the kind of thing that could be argued against.
Emergencies were easier.
A broken engine.
A fight.
A problem with a clear enemy.
Ordinary days required something else.
Consistency.
Presence.
The boring parts.
The parts where nobody thanked you.
The parts where love looked like remembering dentist appointments and buying the right cereal.
Jax had never been good at that.
He looked around the house again.
The proof was everywhere.
A life built without him.
Not because Emma hated him.
Because she had to.
“You hated me.”
Emma shook her head.
“No.”
He looked confused.
“I should have.”
“Maybe.”
She sat down.
“But hate takes energy.”
That was the kind of answer only Emma would give.
Simple.
Honest.
Painful.
“I was angry.”
“I know.”
“I cried.”
Jax looked down.
“I know.”
“How?”
“Because you were never someone who cried quietly.”
For a moment, the old version of them appeared.
The two people who knew each other too well.
Then it disappeared again.
Emma looked toward the stairs.
“I wanted to call you so many times.”
“Why didn’t you?”
“Because every time I imagined the conversation, I did not know what I wanted from you.”
Jax nodded.
That made sense.
He had spent years believing every conversation had to lead somewhere.
An apology.
A solution.
A decision.
But some conversations existed because people needed to stop pretending something did not happen.
“You should have let me know.”
“Yes.”
“You keep saying that.”
“Because it is true.”
He looked at her.
“You are making it hard to be angry.”
Emma gave a tired laugh.
“I’m not trying to.”
“I know.”
They sat quietly.
Not the comfortable silence of people who had everything figured out.
The uncomfortable silence of people who had finally stopped pretending.
A car passed outside.
The sound faded.
The house settled.
Upstairs, Lily moved around her room.
A drawer opened.
Something dropped.
She laughed at herself.
Jax listened.
The sound felt strange.
Not because it was unfamiliar.
Because it felt like something he should have known.
Later that night, Emma showed him the spare room.
“It is not much.”
Jax looked inside.
A small bed.
A lamp.
A dresser.
“It is fine.”
“You can sleep here.”
He nodded.
She stood at the doorway.
Neither moved.
There were a thousand things left unsaid.
Finally, Emma spoke.
“Jax.”
“Yeah?”
“If you are here because you feel guilty, don’t.”
He looked at her.
“What?”
“Guilt does not last.”
The honesty surprised him.
“Then why should I stay?”
Emma looked toward the hallway where Lily’s bedroom door was slightly open.
“Because eventually guilt runs out.”
She paused.
“And then you have to decide if you still want to be here.”
Jax had no answer.
That bothered him.
He was used to answers.
Even bad ones.
But this was not a road with signs.
It was a place he had never been.
Emma walked away.
Jax sat on the edge of the bed.
For years, he had thought the hardest thing would be finding the person he lost.
He was wrong.
The hardest thing was meeting the person he had become while he was gone.
The next morning, Jax woke before the alarm he had not set.
For a few seconds, he did not know where he was.
The ceiling above him was unfamiliar.
The quiet was unfamiliar.
Even the sound of a house waking up felt strange.
Back on the road, mornings had always been simple.
Start the bike.
Check the weather.
Find coffee.
Leave before anyone had a reason to ask him to stay.
This morning there was nowhere to leave.
He sat up slowly.
The spare room looked exactly the same as it had the night before.
A small bed.
A lamp.
A folded blanket on the chair.
Nothing about it belonged to him.
May you like
That was what made it uncomfortable.
He had spent years making sure nothing belonged to him.
