It’s five thirty in the morning, and I thought I’d be safe out here. My dreams have been getting worse and worse since the kiss. Now, Todd comes and accuses me of loving Zach all along. I know it’s all my subconscious playing tricks on me, but I wake in a pool of sweat every morning. Now, I fight even falling asleep. It’s better than the damn nightmares. But when I think about Todd, I grow extremely sad. All of our memories are tainted by the façade he was feeding me. I think about him waking up for work, getting dressed, and kissing me goodbye all the while knowing it was a lie. I wonder how many other lies he told me. Then my sadness shifts back to anger. It’s exhausting.

“We’re all hiding something, aren’t we?”

“And what are you hiding?” I ask as he walks forward.

Wyatt studies me as if he can figure it out. “We’re not talking about me. I know you, Pres. You’ve gotta tell someone, darlin’. It’s eating you up.”

“You don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.”

He laughs. “You’re a whole lot of angry. It seeps from you. It’s keeping you from really being here.”

I shake my head in annoyance. Why does he have to push me? Everyone has let me grieve in my own way, but not Wyatt. “You don’t get to dictate how I handle my life. You’re damn right I’m angry. I’d like you to find someone in my situation who wouldn’t be.”

“You’re not the first person to deal with death.” His voice is layered in sympathy even if his words aren’t. “You’re not grieving, Pres. You’re barely living. Those boys,” he points to the window of their bedroom, “they’re living. They’re helping on the farm, laughing, getting to know a family they didn’t know. They’re actually living, but you?” He pauses as my chest aches. Wyatt stands face to face with me. His brown eyes are open and honest. “You’re just going through the motions.”

Wyatt’s hands brush up and down my arms.

“I don’t know how to feel anything but anger.”

He nods. “Anger I understand.”

“I want it to stop.”

“Take a walk with me,” Wyatt urges. “There’s a place you’ll want to see.”

My choices are simple—either go back to bed and get accosted later or face it now. Well, that’s if Wyatt even lets me go anywhere. He’s pretty damn good at getting his way. And the truth is, there’s a part of me that doesn’t want to be alone. “Fine, but I’m doing it under protest.”

“When have you ever done anything willingly?” He laughs at his own joke and lightens the mood.

I shrug. “Maybe once.”

We walk through the property out toward the creek as the sun is just starting to peek over the horizon. When we were kids, this was our spot. Wyatt and I would come sit out on the big rock in the middle of the water. We’d talk about all the things we were going to do, the way we’d live next to each other and our kids would be inseparable. The dreams of small town best friends.

“You know?” he says as we get close enough to hear the water. “I keep waiting for you to come home.”

I look over with confusion. “Umm,” I say. “I am home.”

“No, you’re still there,” he states. “You’ve got half your heart still gone, Cowgirl.” He tilts his head back looking at the stars. “You ever wonder what else is out there? It’s a big universe, filled with so many people all searching for something else. His eyes meet mine, and he continues, “Tell me, what are you wishing for?”

My heart cracks as the reality that my wishes won’t ever be possible flows through my veins. “It doesn’t matter what I wish for, none of it will ever come true.”

“I don’t know about that. You can always wish, but it doesn’t mean your wishes will get answered. Sometimes you have to choose whether what you’re wishin’ for is really what you want.”

“Okay, Yoda.”

We stand at the edge of the water as I look above me, wondering where Todd is. If he can see and hear this. I question if he knows what’s in my and the boys’ hearts. I ruminate about all the choices I’ve made and their outcomes. Choices are something we take for granted until we no longer have any options, and then we want to go back in time.

“Hop on,” Wyatt says, squatting in front of me.

I scoff. “I’m not getting on your back.”

“Woman, you always have to be a pain in the ass.”

He turns around, crouches back down, and grips my knees. I don’t have a moment to respond before I’m thrown over his shoulder. “Wyatt Hennington! You put me down!”

He trudges into the creek. “You sure about that?”

“No,” I groan. “One day you’ll let me have my way the first time.”

“I doubt that. You usually pick wrong. I figure I’m saving us both a headache by doing it this way.”

“You should talk.”

A few more steps and we’re at the rock. He puts me down, and I curl my legs so he has room. “Let’s talk. You’re stuck out here until you get over your shit.”

I don’t mention that I could walk my way back. I mean, it’s two feet of water. However, I don’t think that’s the point. “What do you want me to say?”

He inches closer and nudges me with his arm. “Start with why you came back.”

“My husband.” I hesitate, needing to breathe a few times before I can continue. “He put us in a really bad spot.”

“How so?”

Oh, the ways are never ending. This is the part I struggle with. How much information can I actually disclose? Why am I hiding all of his transgressions? Todd clearly didn’t give a shit, so why do I? Part of it is pride, I know this. I don’t want people to see how oblivious I was. Because only a fool doesn’t know how bad their life is falling apart. “I was in the dark about every part of my life. I didn’t know that Todd had lost his job or that we were in debt. So when he died, I had a mountain of problems dropped in my lap.”

Wyatt rubs my back. “So you came back to put yourself on track?”

“I came back homeless. We lost it all. Literally. I was so stupid, Wyatt.”

“You weren’t stupid. If your husband didn’t tell you, how would you know?”

I let out a half laugh. “Only someone so selfish and wrapped up in themselves wouldn’t know their husband was out of work. I had no idea how bad things were. I could’ve helped out, but Todd went on like everything was fine. But it wasn’t. It was—is—so bad.”

“I don’t know if you were selfish or just didn’t want to know.”

It’s true, I didn’t want to know anything. I let him handle every aspect of our financials because that was what he did for a living. It was natural for him to take the bills, and I ran the rest of our home. Looking back now, I was ignorant. I should’ve known at least something about our situation. And if I were being completely honest, the writing was on the wall, but I covered it with paint so I didn’t have to see it.

“Do you think I’m pathetic?”