Page 122 of The Long Way Home
I drop the bags on the kitchen counter and flex my fingers, blood rushing back into them. “We brought enough to feed a small army.”
“We are a small army. Rhett alone could outeat three of us,” Margo says, already lining up loaves of bread and bags of chips.
I laugh under my breath and keep my hands moving. I have to distract myself before anxiety combusts me entirely. My skin’s already buzzing, and the weekend hasn’t even begun. We unpack in waves. Luggage into rooms. Groceries into the fridge. Towels tossed over chair backs. Every sound is achingly familiar.
I’m halfway through slicing tomatoes when the low rumble of an engine rolls into the drive. Tires crunch over gravel. My hand freezes mid-air. I don’t look. I don’t need to. My body already knows.
He is here.
Car doors slam outside, the sound carrying up the drive. Voices follow, spilling through the open windows. Wes says something loud to Anderson; Connor’s laugh chases it. Then, lower, the voice that cuts straight through the noise, the one I feel before I even register it.
Rhett.
My pulse snags at the base of my throat. I still for a breath, then lower the blade carefully into the tomato. The skin gives. Juice spills across the cutting board.
One slice at a time.Focus, Rachel.
Lexi bursts in, fanning herself with one hand and dropping her sunglasses onto the counter with the other. “The men are here.”
Slone groans. “God help us all.”
“Come on, Slone, it could be fun.” Lexi wiggles her eyebrows as she says it.
I don’t say a word. I don’t even look up. And still, I feel the exact moment Rhett steps back into this space. Intomyspace. My body has some traitorous radar built just for him. No matter how steady I try to keep my hands, the knife slips slightly, cutting the tomato off-center.
I press my lips together and keep going, praying no one notices I’m a little off.
“Anyone need a hand?” Rhett asks, standing in the doorway.
I look up and catch his eyes for one second. Just one second is all it takes for twelve years rush through me: every trip we took to this house, every stupid joke, every private look we thought no one saw. I drop my gaze and start tearing lettuce, giving my hands a purpose other than betraying me.
If I look again, I’ll fall into that pull. It would be too easy to let yesterday loop in my head—his eyes, his voice, his hands, the way we—
I cut the thought off and step back. “I’ve gotta find a corkscrew,” I mutter, then disappear down the hall.
The rest of the afternoon becomes an exercise in avoidance. I drift from room to room like a ghost, hands busy, head down. I speak only when necessary, moving so I don’t have to stand still and risk looking at him again. But Rhett knows. I can feel it. He knows I’m spiraling. I’m honestly surprised he hasn’t tried to say anything yet.
Eventually, we make sandwiches and carry them down to the dock. The sun is high; the lake glitters. People spread out in a long row of faded Adirondacks. I wedge myself between Lexi and Slone. Rhett drops two seats away.
My skin pricks every second he’s within five feet. Part of me wants to lean in. Part of me wants to run. It isn’t that I don’t want him. I’ve wanted him for what feels like my entire adult life. But I can’t risk losing him once he realizes his feelings are born of grief. I survived four years without him once. I won’t gamble on that silence twice.
So I make the choice that feels safest: distance.
“You’re awfully quiet today,” Lexi teases, nudging me with her elbow.
I force a laugh. “Just tired, Lex.”
The night unspools in fragments. We grill burgers out back, smoke curling into the trees. Margo hums in the kitchen, mixing cocktails and lining up the mismatched glasses. Slone throws on a playlist, and the low, lazy music drifts through the cabin. One by one, everyone wanders toward the living room. The windows glow orange with the sunset’s reflection.
I laugh when I’m supposed to. I sip just enough to soften my edges, to remain part of the group instead of the ghost I’ve been all day.
Connor plants himself at the coffee table, deck of cards in hand. He shuffles with the cocky ease of someone who’s done this a hundred times, a smirk already in place.
“Alright,” he says, spreading the cards. “Who’s ready to get schooled?”
Wes laughs, “Please, last time you played, you folded before the first hand was even dealt.”
Connor shoots back, “I was letting you guys have your moment. It was a strategy move, Callahan.”
