Like he would say no to that. “I’d like to see someone try to fuckin’ stop me.”

CHAPTER NINETEEN

Josiah

They went to a beach town about an hour away from home. Josiah sat in the front seat while Tristan drove. Mateo slept behind him, probably tired from working late last night.

“It’s gorgeous.” Josiah looked out the window. Despite the gray skies and dark clouds, he saw nothing but the beauty in the ocean stretching as far as he could see; cliffs and rocks and forever in front of them.

“That’s how I ended up here. Did I ever tell you that?” Tristan asked from beside him.

“No. You’re not the most open of books,” he teased, and Tristan smiled.

“Smartass.”

“I try... Tell me, though.”

Tristan’s tongue ran over his bottom lip before he continued. “My mom was working a graveyard shift at a restaurant one night. I was young, I can’t remember my exact age, but I would sit in one of the booths with her, sometimes sleep there while she worked if I didn’t have school the next day. One night this older couple sat in the booth in front of me. They were probably in their sixties, but to me they were ancient. They huddled together looking at this book and talking about all the adventures they were going to have. They kept smiling at each other and touching hands. I think...I think that was the first time I realized love existed for some people. It had only been an illusion I’d heard about before that. I’d definitely never seen it.”

The sadness in Tristan’s voice wrapped around Josiah, a cold hand giving him the shivers.

“I remember how they looked at each other...the way they sounded when they spoke about their future. It made me hate them. I wanted my mother to have that. I wanted to have their happiness.”

“That just means you’re human. We all want that,” Josiah told him.

Tristan glanced his way. “Forever the optimist. We need that, Mateo and I. We’d drown in our pain if it wasn’t for you.”

“That’s not true. Still, you have me. You’ll both always have me.”

Tristan nodded and continued. “I remember the wife went to the bathroom, and the husband went to pay at the register on the way out. I realized they’d forgotten their book. It sat there on the table, and all I could think was I wanted it. They were going to get to live whatever was inside of it, but I wouldn’t. Even as a child, I was pessimistic,” he chuckled.

“The woman came out, and I watched them speak to my mom at the register. I knew I should grab their book and bring it to them, but I didn’t. Instead, I took it and went to the bathroom. I stayed in there so long, afraid to come out and afraid to get caught, that my mom finally opened the door and called my name. My hands shook as I stuffed the book into my back pocket. I was scared to death, knew I’d gotten caught, but when I came out, she only said she had been worried about me.

“The couple was long gone by then. For weeks afterward, I didn’t look at the book. Every time I considered it, guilt held me back. I almost threw it away a dozen times, but I wanted it...and felt guilty for having it at the same time. That was part of their dream, their plans, and even though it was just a book, I shouldn’t have kept that part of them.”

Josiah’s chest ached for the pain the young Tristan must have felt. The pain he still felt. “You didn’t take their dream. They still had it.”

Tristan shook his head, as though he didn’t know what to do with Josiah.

“Finally I couldn’t take it anymore. I pulled it out of the bag of clothes I had, because we didn’t have dressers. It was pictures of San Francisco, and other cities around the bay area. Wineries, coastal towns, things like that. It gave descriptions, and in the margins were notes they’d made about what they wanted to see and when. It was this strange mix of guilt at having taken this personal roadmap from them, jealousy that they could still live it, and...maybe hope that I could have it one day. I would pretend that it would be my future. After a point, I was so angry, because by then, I thought it would never happen, so I hid it, and didn’t look at it again. When I needed to leave New York later on, this is where I came.”

“Another resemblance.”

Tristan turned to him. “What do you mean?”

“Just that this area was mine and Teo’s dream, and it was yours as well. It’s another piece of us that makes us stronger. Full.  Do you still have it? The book?”

Tristan’s features tightened at that, and Josiah realized he’d hit a nerve.