“And yet?” he urged me on.

And yet, I wanted to be just like her. I wanted to be an odd character, a freak of nature. I wanted to stumble and laugh out loud. I wanted to find her beautiful disaster and mix it together with my own mess. I wanted the freedom she swam in, and her fearlessness of living in the moment.

I wanted to know what it meant to be a part of her world.

To be a man who felt everything.

I wanted to hold her, but still have her move freely in my arms. I wanted to taste her lips and breathe in a part of her soul as I gave her a glimpse of mine.

I didn’t want to be her friend—no.

I wanted to be so much more.

Yet, I knew the possibility of that was impossible. She was the one thing off-limits, and the only thing I’d ever craved. It wasn’t fair, the way this story was unfolding for me, yet it wasn’t at all shocking. I never wrote happily ever afters, and Lucy would never be featured in my final chapter.

“You’re overthinking something right now, Graham, and I urge you to believe in the opposite,” he told me. “Jane has been gone for almost a year now, and let’s face it—you never looked at her the way you stare at Lucy. Your eyes never lit up the way they do whenever she walks into a room. You spent most of your life struggling to avoid embracing a form of happiness, my son. When in the world will you allow yourself to be free of the chains you placed upon yourself? This life is short, and you never know how many chapters you have left in your novel, Graham. Live each day as if it’s the final page. Breathe each moment as if it’s the final word. Be brave, my son. Be brave.”

I rolled my eyes and started walking down the steps. “Professor Oliver?”

“Yes?”

“Shut up.”

“I have to stop by the store to grab some diapers. I hope that’s okay,” Graham told me as he pulled the car into the parking lot of a twenty-four-hour grocery store.

“That’s fine.”

He hurried inside, and when he came out, he tossed a few bags into the trunk and hopped back into the car. “Okay,” he said, putting the car in drive. “Which way do we go to get to the cabin?”

“What?”

“I said which way do we go? To visit your mother’s tree?”

My chest tightened, and I shook my head. His words replayed in my head as I blankly stared his way. “What? No way, Graham. You’re already behind on your book, and I just can’t imagine having you drive that far just to—”

“Lucille Hope Palmer.”

“Yes, Graham Michael Russell?”

“You’ve never missed a holiday visiting your mother, right?”

I bit my bottom lip and nodded. “Right.”

“Okay then. Which way do we go?”

My eyes closed, and my heart beat faster and faster as I realized Graham wasn’t going to let this one go. I hadn’t even mentioned how much my heart ached not seeing Mama that day. I hadn’t even mentioned how hard it was to watch Susie and Karla love on their mother that evening. A tear rolled down my cheek, and a smile found its way to my lips. “You can take highway 43 north for two hours.”

“Perfect,” he said as he pulled out of the parking spot. When I opened my eyes, I glanced back at a sleeping Talon, and my hands wrapped around my heart-shaped necklace.

When we arrived, it was pitch-dark out until I plugged the extension cord into the outlet outside the cabin. The plug lit up the area with the white lights Mari and I had hung in December for our Christmas visit. Mama’s tree lit up bright, and I walked over to it, standing still as I watched the lights sparkle. I sat down on the ground and clasped my fingers, looking up at the tree. It was bittersweet, staring at the beautiful branches. Each day it grew was a day Mama was gone, but visiting her in the spring was my favorite time to come, because that was when the leaves began to bloom.

“She’s beautiful,” Graham said, walking over to me with Talon bundled up in his arms.

“Isn’t she?”

He nodded. “She takes after her daughter.”

I smiled. “And her granddaughter.”

He reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a pack of licorice, making my heart skip a beat.

“You picked it up at the grocery store?” I asked.

“I just wanted today to be good for you.”

“It is,” I replied, overwhelmed by his kindness. “It’s a very good day.”

As we sat there staring, breathing, existing, Graham pulled out his cell phone and started playing “Rise Up” by Andra Day.

“You said she might like it,” he told me.

Once again, I began to cry.

And it was beautiful.

“Are we friends, Lucille?” Graham asked.

I turned to him, my heart feeling tight in my chest. “Yes.”

“Then can I tell you a secret?”

“Yes, of course. Anything.”

“After I tell you, I need you to pretend I never spoke of it, all right? If I don’t say it now, I fear the feeling will only grow, and it will mess with my head even more than it is now. So, after this, I need you to pretend I never said this. After this I need you to go back to being my friend, because being friends with you makes me a better person. You make me a better human.”

“Graham—”

He turned and placed sleeping Talon into her car seat. “Wait, just tell me first—do you feel anything? Anything more than friendship when we do this?” He reached out and took my hand in his.

Nerves.

He moved in closer to me, our bodies closer than they’d ever been. “Do you feel anything when I do this?” he whispered, slowly grazing the back of his hand against my cheek. My eyes shut.

Chills.

He moved in even closer, his small exhales hovering over my lips, his exhales becoming my inhales. I couldn’t open my eyes because I would see his lips. I couldn’t open my eyes because I would crave to be closer. I couldn’t open my eyes because I could hardly breathe.

“Do you feel anything when we’re this close?” he asked softly.

Excitement.

I opened my eyes and blinked once.

“Yes.”

A wave of relief traveled through him and he reached into his back pocket, pulling out two pieces of paper. “I made two lists yesterday,” he told me. “I sat at my desk all day listing all the reasons why I shouldn’t feel the way I feel about you, and that list is long. It’s detailed with bullet points expressing every single reason why this—whatever this is between us—is a bad idea.”