Page 130 of Cut Off
It turns out, you can move five hundred miles away and still end up exactly here, in a parking lot in Dickens, Idaho, under a rickety awning, with a nine-year-old around your middle and a man who learned, finally, how to say the words out loud.
I am, against every odd I stacked against myself, exactly where I’m supposed to be.
The ring goes on my finger. It fits.
Epilogue
JONAH
July in Idaho means sweat behind the knees, sunburned ear tips, and a lake that smells like every day of my childhood summers. I’m standing in it, water up to my waist, tracking a nine-year-old as he swims, arms slicing clean, head turning for the breaths. I taught him that. Or, more accurately, I bribed him into it with three week’s worth of ice cream sandwiches.
He’s in the zone. Laser focus. He doesn’t look back, just burns water.
He’s good at this.
But if he so much as sputters, I can make it to him in three strokes, maybe two if I ignore the shoulder. But I don’t think he’s noticed the distance. He’s busy.
Up on the dock, Zoe’s got her bare feet swinging over the edge, toenails neon, sunglasses stuck in her hair, and a book open on her lap. She hasn’t turned a page in twenty minutes. Every time she thinks nobody’s watching, she glances up,tracking us, the hint of a smile tipping the corner of her mouth. She denies it, but she likes watching us.
I let my eyes hang on her, as usual. The sunlight’s chewing through the top of her tank, dusting her shoulders with gold. Her hair’s up, messy, and there’s a glint under her glasses—maybe sweat, maybe the lens, maybe both.
The air tastes like wood and pine needles, and the only thing on the schedule is “not moving unless you want to.”
The sun’s angled right on us, and sweat beads down my spine, but the water’s cool, so it’s all good.
Eli has a goal: the old orange buoy bobbing about twenty yards out, faded from a thousand summers, covered in the kind of algae nobody wants to think about. It’s the historic finish line. Every bonehead in this town has tried to make it from dock to buoy and back—usually ending with a show-off belly flop or, in my case, a decade ago, a trip to urgent care after I cut my foot on a sharp rock.
He lifts his head. “You and I. Race to the buoy and back.”
“On what planet do you beat me in a race?”
He grins, evil. “I get a head start. Twenty seconds.”
I scoff.
“Five,” I counter, knowing full well he needs the twenty.
“Fifteen.”
“Ten, and I’ll tie a hand behind my back.”
He perks up. “Any hand?”
I twist my left arm behind and let my good arm stay free.
He does the cocky float, rolling in a circle. “Deal.”
Zoe sits up straight, legs swinging. “Hold on, you’re racing with your arm behind your back?” She sets the book down, now officially a prop. “Is this a competition or a bad idea?”
“I’mnotusing the bad arm, Zo. That’ll keep it safe.”
She rolls her eyes. “Man-boy logic.”
Eli positions himself like an Olympic starter, hands on the buoy, legs primed. He’s counting in his own head, lips moving, and I let him have it. At “go,” he launches, thrashing the first five strokes just to make a point.
I drift, keeping my left arm tucked, fighting the urge to chase early.
Zoe is full-on coaching from the sideline now, voice up. “Kick harder, Eli! Jonah’s old. You can wear him down!”
