Total pages in book: 143
Estimated words: 130275 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 651(@200wpm)___ 521(@250wpm)___ 434(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 130275 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 651(@200wpm)___ 521(@250wpm)___ 434(@300wpm)
Savannah released a choked, single light laugh that was a knife to my heart. “I took out every book I could find in the library about cancer treatments. I was young but truly believed that if I could just find something we hadn’t yet tried, it would save her.” Savannah’s accent was a fraction stronger as she said those words. Unbarred and filled with passion. I could just imagine her, staying up all night looking for a solution. “It was how I coped, I suppose. I was book smart. I was good at science. I felt I could help her. Even up until her very last days, long after Poppy had accepted her fate, I was still trying desperately to find a cure.”
Savannah watched a young woman walk down the steps of the ghat and sit on a lower level. She had a picture of someone in her hand that she then raised and placed over her heart. I got the impression she had lost them too.
Another person just like us.
Savannah faced me again. Meeting my eyes, she rasped, “I used to worry about losing her. Now I’m terrified of forgetting her.” Blood ran from my face. Savannah had put words to the feelings that gnawed away at me daily. I’d long wondered if I held on to this grief and anger like I had because then I wouldn’t have to truly say goodbye to Cillian. Because I was holding on to him, he would never truly leave my life.
I focused on the rippling river before us and said, “Every time I try to picture a world where Cillian is gone, and I’ve moved on, it doesn’t feel right.” I shook my head. “After Cillian died, friends and relatives were around more, were engulfing us all in support—dropping off food, sitting with us while we fell apart. Then months passed, and those people went back to their lives, to their own problems and families—as they should. But we were still there, frozen in the sadness, unable to move on from grief’s asphalt grip that had cemented us into the ground.” I swallowed the lump in my throat. “We watched life resume around us, but still, we couldn’t move.”
Savannah shuffled closer to me, resting her head on my bicep, and I could breathe a little easier. “I feel like I still haven’t moved. I’m still in that asphalt, watching the world exist around me, while I don’t live any of it.”
“What about your parents?” Savannah’s voice was careful. It was obvious I had pushed them away. A flicker of shame cut through me. Leo talked to them. Not me, and guilt assaulted me. They had lost one son. I knew they were just trying to help, but I’d just been so angry. I’d been taking it all out on them for so long.
“They’ve tried to move on,” I said. I dropped my head to rest on the top of Savannah’s. “They’ve returned to work. Christ, Savannah, they are trying.” My voice stuttered when I said, “I’ve been a terrible son.”
Savannah’s head whipped up, determination in her eyes. “You have not!” she said firmly. “You are hurting, Cael. You are grieving. You are struggling. That does not make you bad.”
I couldn’t help but smile through the pain at my pint-size girl coming to my defense. And she did it with the force of a hurricane.
“What?” she asked, questioning my smile.
I cupped her cheek, heart swelling as she nuzzled into it, eyes closing at the touch. She was so soft under me yet had the tenacity of a shark. I didn’t think she saw that in herself. She thought herself weak. I had never met anyone stronger.
“You’re carrying me through,” I said quietly, almost nonexistent.
Savannah tilted her head to me, and the love I saw in her eyes would stay with me for a lifetime. I wasn’t sure anyone had ever seen me the way Savannah saw me. I’d never loved anyone like the way I was so consumed by her and everything she was and stood for.
Savannah had spent months and months searching for a miracle to save her sister. I had been given one when I’d least expected it. I had been given her. Maybe the universe knew we needed each other in order to survive. Maybe it knew that we had both lost and were hurting, so it sent our souls’ other halves to make us somehow more whole.
I was sure Savannah would tell me it was Cillian and Poppy conspiring from their place among the stars.
“I love you,” I said and kissed her again. How could I not?
Savannah kissed me back. “I love you too, Cael Woods.” Savannah sat closer still. It wasn’t close enough. I reached over and lifted her until she sat on my lap. She laughed and it was like hearing happiness. Then I kissed her. I kissed her until my lips felt bruised and we’d run out of breath.