June First
: Part 3 – Chapter 36

Brant, age 27

My lips stretch with amusement as I watch Wendy walk out of the restaurant kitchen, her hips swaying, her burgundy hair swinging.

“I wish Miss Nippersink would funnel her fiery tenacity into her hostess duties,” Pauly mutters under his breath. He’s talking to me, but he’s really talking to Wendy.

She stops, spins back around, and marches over to where Pauly and I are standing. She jabs a long nail at Pauly’s chest. “You think you’re such a big brute, you know that? Everyone here is afraid of you, but not me. No, sir, I can see right through your surly exterior and…” Her finger snaps up to his eyes. “And furrowed brow of scorn.”

I hide my laugh.

If Pauly is entertained, he doesn’t show it. His stance remains surly. His brow remains furrowed. “You underestimate me, Stellina.”

“You have a parakeet named Petey. Only softies would name a bird Pe—” Wendy falters, her head cocking to the side. “What did you call me?”

“Nothing of consequence.” He shoos her away with the flick of his wrist, almost looking like he might smile. “Carry on, now. I am not paying you to ruffle my feathers.”

“Ooh, so you feel ruffled,” she snips, planting both hands along her hips. Wendy’s eyes cut to me with a haughty smirk. “Did you hear that, Brant? He’s admitting to having actual feelings.”

“Feelings of contempt, yes,” Pauly corrects.

I lift both hands, palms forward. “I’m staying out of this.”

“You’re frazzled right now. I can see it,” she claims, taking a step closer and squinting her gaze. “Look, your left eye is twitching.”

He frowns. “It is merely an instinctive reaction to your irksome personality. I cannot help it. Just as you cannot help being irksome.”

“I am not irksome.”

“You are a bother, I assure you.”

Wendy’s lips purse. “Fire me, then. I dare you.”

“I will not. The customers tolerate you for unbeknownst reasons, and it is simply not worth the time it would cost me to replace and train your replacement.”

I watch as they stare each other down, Wendy holding her own, and Pauly towering over her with two muscled arms crossed over his sizable chest. He’s lost quite a bit of weight over the past year after joining the gym with me. I’m there every single morning as a means to keep myself distracted, because mornings are hard waking up alone—especially once you’ve experienced how it feels to wake up beside the one you love.

Pauly told me he needed to start putting his health first. He’s forty-five years old and lost his older brother to a heart attack this past winter. We grew closer after that, as I could relate to his loss on a highly personal level.

Honestly, I consider him a friend.

And as an observant friend who’s pretty damn good at reading the room, I’m almost positive he has the hots for my ex-girlfriend.

Interesting.

With a dramatic sigh, Wendy takes a step back, rolling her neck. “Face it, Pauly. You’d miss me.”

“I absolutely would not.”

“Keep telling yourself that,” she says, floating away in her black pantsuit and silver nametag, then waving her hand dismissively. “And don’t call me spirulina. That stuff smells like fish.”

“Stellina,” he chides to her retreating back.

Her response is muffled by the two double doors whipping shut.

Pauly and I glance at each other.

“She is quite incorrigible, yes?”

His tone is unmoved, even though I recognize the charmed flicker in his eyes. “You like her,” I chuckle, readjusting my apron.

“I tolerate her. She keeps me on my toes and smells like my Nonna’s Italian bake shop.” Running his fingers and thumb along the inky scruff lining his jaw, his watch catches the fluorescent kitchen lights. “Perhaps I should fire her, after all—she is trouble.”

“Or maybe you should ask her out.”

Two dark eyes slant in my direction. “I am twice her age, Mr. Elliott. That would not be wise.” As he says this, he drifts away for a moment, almost as if he’s considering the notion of doing something unwise. He shakes his head with a gruff cough. “Enough bumming around. We will be opening shortly,” he tells me, pausing for a fleeting moment before he disappears around the corner. “By the way, have you considered my proposal?”

Tightening my apron, I tense.

After I turned down the Seattle offer, Pauly has been relentless in trying to secure me a higher paying position at a different restaurant location.

The restaurant just happens to be in New York.

I shuffle my feet, reaching for a rag. “I’m starting to wonder if you’re just trying to get rid of me,” I tease, dodging the question.

He doesn’t know. He doesn’t know about June, so he doesn’t understand why I’m not jumping at the chance to further my career and relocate closer to my “sister.”

I told him I didn’t want to leave the Baileys behind, even though they’re two people who would probably love to see me gone… to any place but there.

But he keeps poking me about it. He said he’ll move staffing around to accommodate me the moment I say the word.

Pauly pivots toward me, still stroking his short beard. His expression hints at a trace of levity. “Nonsense, Mr. Elliott. I’m hoping to join you there.”

My brows knit together, and I drop the rag to the counter. “What?”

“It is my home,” he tells me, nodding his head. “I grew up in Tarrytown, just north of Manhattan. I have been considering moving back, and I think you may be the final push I need.” A low chuckle rumbles his chest as he turns away from me again, lifting his hand with a curt wave. “No pressure, of course.”

I stand there for a moment, watching him move around to the back of the kitchen as my heart picks up speed. The transfer offer hasn’t strayed far from my mind since Pauly brought it up over Thanksgiving week this past year as we lifted weights together.

June had video-called me that day, a few hours before her parents arrived to spend the holiday with her. Pauly was near, so I tried to keep my longing in check. I tried to be aware of the way my eyes danced with love as I stared at her through the phone in her brown sweater dress, just a shade darker than her hair. I tried to prevent my mouth from spewing out foolish things that would give us away. And I feel like I’d succeeded, for the most part.

But Pauly noticed something.

“Anima Mia. It is my Manhattan location,” Pauly said, his workout tank drenched with sweat as his muscles flexed and his neck corded. “You should work there.”

I bent over, stretching my legs. “That’s a very generous offer. I’ll think about it.”

He grunted at me. “You will not. I know when you are lying, Mr. Elliott.”

Chuckling, I approached the weight bench, trying to ignore the way my skin hummed with the desperate yearning to say yes. To be close to June. “You can call me Brant, you know. I think we’ve reached a first-name basis at this point.”

“I will call you Brant when you become my executive chef at Anima Mia.”

Fair enough.

He’s hounded me ever since, bringing it up almost daily… and every day, it gets harder and harder to say no.

Letting out a sigh, I press my palms to the metal countertop, a thought trickling back to my mind. Curiosity nudges me, so I pull out my phone and do a Google search for the Italian word, “Stellina.”

Then, I smile.

“Little star,” I murmur aloud.

Yep… Pauly’s toast.

When a knock sounds on my front door the following day as I’m lounging on the couch after a run, I figure it’s probably Ethel, the next door neighbor, wondering if her cat wandered into my unit again. “Coming,” I call out, sweeping back my sweat-damp hair and traipsing over to the door. I pull it open, about to tell Ethel that Blinkers isn’t here, when my words fall off.

My breath catches.

“Andrew.”

Andrew Bailey stands right outside my door with eyes rimmed red and hair looking grayer than ever.

He’s aged.

And I can’t help but feel responsible for that.

Swallowing down the brick in my throat, my fingers curl around the frame as I stare at him, slack-jawed and shaken.

His throat bobs, his stance wearied as he gestures past me, into the apartment. “Can I come in?”

I nod instantly.

It’s been two years since I’ve had any real interaction with the man who raised me as his own son. Aside from seeing him at the grocery store one time, where we locked eyes, then sped our respective carts in opposite directions, I did receive a letter from him in the mail last fall.

Well, it wasn’t really a letter—it was only two words.

“I’m trying.”

I wasn’t entirely sure what it had meant.

I’m trying to forgive.

I’m trying to forget what happened.

I’m trying to forget you.

Samantha and I have met up for coffee and lunch a few times since everything unfolded—since she held me on her living room floor with a mother’s love, after I’d failed her as a son. And I’ve looked forward to those dates. They’ve been critical in keeping me moving forward, because if someone I betrayed so severely, so wretchedly, can still care about my well-being, then maybe I should care about it, too.

While that first year without June was one of the hardest years of my life, this second year has brought about a semblance of healing. I’m accepting that what happened, happened, and I’m learning to live with it in a way that doesn’t eat me alive and hollow me out. I’ve stayed busy with work, but more as a means to nourish my creative passion for cooking versus using my job as a way of forgetting. I’ve maintained friendships with Kip and my co-workers, and with Aunt Kelly, and I’ve fostered those relationships, letting them restore the rotted parts of me.

People talk about rehabilitation all the time. Broken bodies learning to walk again. Impaired minds fighting disease, addiction, and dark thoughts.

But have they ever had to rehabilitate a heart?

Hearts fall apart, too. Bodies crumble, minds fail us, and hearts turn hopeless. They can deteriorate if we’re not careful, and for all the tragedies I’ve suffered through, for all the tears and pitfalls, I can’t think of anything more tragic than a hopeless heart.

The heart is the crux of life itself, and once it starts to wither, everything else starts to wither, too. And that’s a damn shame. That’s a devastating injustice to everything we’ve fought so hard to overcome, and to everything still worth fighting for.

And there’s always something. There’s always a proverbial light at the end of the tunnel, waiting for us to turn that corner.

I wasn’t ready to give up; I didn’t want to wither.

But for all my progress, for all my mending, there’s still been a dark cloud lurking overhead, keeping me from chasing that light.

It’s a cloud that goes by the name of Andrew Bailey—the man trudging past me with a nearly grown-out beard steeped in silver, heavy wrinkles, and a defeated glaze in his eyes.

It looks like he’s checking his own heart into rehab.

I watch as he slinks past me, running his fingers through thinning gray hair, then plants his hands on his hips as he lets out a long sigh. He just stands there for a while with his back to me, a few feet away, while I linger by the open door, clinging to it as if I might need something to hold me upright.

Moments pass.

Silent but deafening moments.

Then he pulls something out of his pocket and tosses it onto my kitchen counter. “I’m done,” he says softly.

My grip loosens on the door. Scraping my teeth together, I glance at the index card sitting on my counter scribbled with familiar handwriting.

“I’m done trying to fight this,” he confesses, his tone full of remorse and acquiescence. “I’m done living in the past, wishing I could change it. I’m done ostracizing my son when I already know what it feels like to lose one. I’m done being angry and hateful when I have so much to be thankful for. I’m done trying,” he tells me, finally meeting my eyes. Finally seeing me for the first time in two years. “I want to start doing. I want to start living again.”

Emotion swells in my heart and stings my eyes. I drop my hand from the door and close it behind me—as if I know, without a doubt, I won’t be needing to run. I take a few careful steps forward, turning my attention to the index card, trying to read it through blurred tears.

Andrew follows my gaze. “I’ve reread that damn card every single morning since Samantha wrote it,” he says painfully. “It’s haunted me.”

My eyes trail back to him as I come to a full stop.

“I ran into your boss last week when I went golfing,” he continues. “Pauly. He told me he’s been trying to convince you to go to New York—to take a job transfer that would better your career and potentially change your life. He doesn’t understand why you won’t do it.”

I drop my head and close my eyes.

“But I know why.” Andrew runs a palm down his face, shaking his head. His cheeks fill with air as he blows out a breath. “I’ve lost so much, Brant… so much,” he murmurs, voice hitching. Grief steals his words for a moment as he tries to regroup. “But so have you. And because I’m choosing to wallow in this limbo of wishing I could change the past and wishing I can shape the future, all I’m really doing is not choosing what’s right in front of me. I’m not choosing what matters, and that’s my family. That’s my children. That’s you.” Tears pool in the corner of his eyes, then track down his cheeks. “Yes, we’ve all lost, but until I choose forgiveness, until I choose healing… we’re all just going to keep on losing. And I’m real damn sick of losing.”

I inhale sharply, my chest constricting and my heart racing. “I’m sick of losing, too.”

He swipes away the wet tears, nodding his head. Then he lets out a broken sound—or maybe it’s a healing sound—and closes the gap between us, pulling me into a bone-crushing embrace.

My eyes squeeze shut as I hug him back, wrapping my arms around the man I’ve missed for two long years. “I’m sorry,” I say. “I’m sorry for everything I’ve put you through.”

Andrew breaks down. He drops his forehead to my shoulder and sobs, and we linger like that, as if we’re making up for all the hugs we’ve missed out on. “I’m sorry, too,” he whispers raggedly, still holding me tight. “I’m not saying everything is fixed or erased, and I’m not saying this will be easy for me. I can accept things for how they are, while still struggling to understand them. Just bear with me, son.”

Hearing him call me son pulls hot tears from my eyes, and my throat stings with sentiment as I ask, “What are you saying?”

“I’m saying… go to New York, Brant.” Andrew gives my back a sharp smack, then pulls away, still gripping my shoulders. He looks me in the eyes, and for a swift second, I see Theo. I see their paralleled blessing shining back at me. “And whatever happens after that, happens. It’s what’s meant to be.”

Hope blinds me, like the first light of day—a light in the form of forgiveness.

A second chance.

We don’t specifically mention June, but I know exactly what he’s telling me:

Go to New York for your career, even if you end up staying for my daughter.

He doesn’t stay long after that.

Emotions are high, and we’ve said what we needed to say.

As Andrew steps out my front door, I run a hand down my face, letting out a deep breath, and I glance down at the index card still lying atop my counter.

My heart gallops.

And then I pick it up and read it.

September 13, 2020

• Vilomah. I’ve never heard of this word before, but apparently, it’s what they call a parent who has lost a child. It means, “against the natural order.” Only… it feels like I’ve lost so much more than that. I’ve lost three children, and I’m losing my husband in the process. I don’t think they make a word for someone like me. The only word I can think of is… Sad.

I drop the notecard back to the countertop… then, I quickly change my mind.

Instead, I shred it.

I tear it into tiny pieces and toss it into the trash can, wishing I had a match to set it on fire.

I’m done being sad.

We’re all done being sad.

It’s time to chase our light.

Do you want to know exactly what’s hiding in that light at the end of the tunnel?

Well, I’ll tell you.

That’s your legs working again after months of physical therapy.

That’s the medication readjusting the chemicals in your brain after you took a razor to your wrist.

That’s the bronze A.A. chip after a year of painful sobriety.

That’s the warm tickle in your stomach when you replace love again after a messy divorce.

That’s forgiveness after you’ve hit rock bottom.

That light shines differently for everyone, but at the end of the day, it all amounts to the same thing—it’s the better version of yourself; the person you’ve been trying to get back to.

It’s your healing heart.

And a heart can only heal if you choose to let it.

That same night, I packed my bags and booked a flight to New York City.