Page 116 of The Professor's Wife

Instead, my shoulders shook with my sobs. I opened the passenger-side door and nearly fell out, walking barefoot along the dirt ground. I didn’t want to face Tristan. Didn’t want to talk. I just needed to be alone.

I found a fallen tree in the woods. I sat on the moss-covered trunk and buried my face in my hands, breathing through the pain.

My sweet June.

I’m so sorry.

Tristan followed, but he wasn’t so close behind me that I felt his presence. I just knew he was there, watching over me.

Eventually, the heat set in. Even under the cover of trees, I couldn’t escape it. I looked up, listening intently to the sounds around me. The birds chirping. A woodpecker tapping at a tree. The sticks breaking under Tristan’s feet as he settled against a nearby tree to watch me.

“I had a dream,” I said, aware he was listening intently to every word. “It was about my sister. She was calling out for me, and I…I didn’t answer.”

“What’s her name?” he asked.

“Her name was June.”

Was.

Is.

Because she was still my sister, even in death.

Tristan inhaled sharply, catching it. I confirmed it, adding, “She wanted to tell me something. She called me two days before she died. I…I never got back to her, and now…sometimes I get these dreams. I know she’s there, but I can’t see her, and she’s calling out for me, and like the phone call, I never answered. I never called her back.”

“I’m so fucking sorry, Daze.”

I was glad he kept his distance.

Because right now I needed it.

I just needed to feel it.

Something bad is going to happen.

The thought kept coming at me, confusing me, terrifying me. I strained, trying to understand it. Was it from the dream? Was she trying to tell me this? Had she been trying to warn me back then about the events that would follow after her death?

How much did she know?

“You’re right,” I whispered, pained. “You can’t outrun the past, Tristan.”

“No, you can’t,” he agreed quietly.

“So, then what are we doing?” I shrugged helplessly. “Are we wasting our time driving into the constant unknown?”

“I think when we’ve had enough, we’ll know that it’s time.”

“Time to what?”

“Time to confront what’s been hurting us.”

I wanted to tell him.

I wanted to let him know about…everything.

I opened my mouth.

To let him know what I’d done.