Page 67 of Gravity

On the floor, leaning against the couch, Grayson sits with his head bowed and his arm resting on his knees, a photo hanging from his fingertips. The atmosphere in the room makes my chest tight and my heart pound and I’m unsure whether to stay put or to go to him.

But that pull between us makes the decision for me.

“Grayson?” I say softly, taking a step closer.

Looking around the room, my eyes latch on to more items and my heart becomes pained with what I uncover. A shiver runs down my spine.

They’re still here.

All his mom’s personal belongings are still here, decorating his home as if she’s never left.

Taking another step, I let my fingers trail over Sandie’s soft, rose blanket that is draped over her chair. Her sandals still sit at the side of the fireplace while her bookcase in the corner—now covered in a layer of dust—remains untouched. Everywhere I look, the ghost of Sandie Bennett is still very much alive.

“Oh, Grayson,” I whisper, placing my hand on my chest as tears now prickle my eyes. All this time he’s not only been hiding from the world, he’s been too afraid to let her go.

Needing to comfort him, I go over and kneel in front of him without a word. The ache in my chest is excruciating, and I can’t bear the thought of knowing that this is quite possibly how he’s spent his nights alone since her death if he wasn’t working himself to the ground at the bar to stop himself from truly breaking.

“Hey,” I whisper, gently placing my hand on his arm. “Look at me. It’s just me.”

When he lifts his head, I have to fight to keep it together. His glassy eyes, haunted and torn, stare back at me. The agony in his blues is heavy, and the anguish in his features is too much.

“I advised your brother to seek help today, yet I’m no better because here I am, stuck in a world I’m desperate to get out of but don’t know how.” His lip quivers, and the vulnerability in him cuts me in two. “She’s everywhere I look, Nora, and as much as I dislike that, I don’t know how to let her go either. Some days, I loathe her for what she’d become. Other days, I have so much love for her its unbearable because she’s not here for me to tell her. And now I’m at the point where I don’t know what to do.”

“Grayson...”

He welcomes me into his arms, and I hold him like my life depends on it. His grip on me is desperate as he buries his head in my neck, holding me with just as much power as if he needs my strength to find his own.

“Tell me what to do,” he whispers.

“Shh, I’m here now.”

I hold him close, tracing my fingers down his back to reassure and calm him as the rapid beat of his heart vibrates against me. The loss of his mom has always been in his eyes every time I’ve looked at him, but tonight his demons have defeated him. When I feel his body start to relax, I shift myself to the floor and sit beside him, taking his hand in mine.

“I’m sorry,” he whispers, looking at me with a half-hearted smile and glossy eyes. “A slight change in my mood from yesterday, huh?”

“It’s a change I needed to witness, Grayson. It’s okay to break. No matter when that time is. We never apologize for being sad, remember.”

“I thought I was doing okay, or at least, that’s what I’ve been telling myself, but after today…”

I stroke his arm with the tips of my fingers.

Thinking back to when I first found him, I question what Asher has to do with this and what’s happened to lead Grayson down this path. Or maybe he has no clue himself and it’s the grief taking all his control. Either way, living in a house of haunted memories is not going to help him heal.

Picking the photo back up, he studies it for a moment, drawing his finger over his mother’s face. The faded image is of Sandie and Grayson when he was a young boy. The smile on their faces is priceless as they each stand holding a balloon. Sandie was always a beautiful, flawless woman with hair as soft as silk.

“She was beautiful,” I whisper.

“She was. Her smile was one of my favorite things about her. The way it made her eyes sparkle. The way her face lit up. The summers when school was out, and Dad was overseas were the best. Cotton candy, days at the beach, and rollerblading were just a few of the things we did when I was a kid. I swear, half the time she looked forward to those days more than I did. She’d bounce her way across the house in excitement, loving that it was a new day for adventure and fun. I guess those were the times she’d felt more alive and free than any other.” He exhales. “Life changed the second Dad would land back on Virginia soil, and her smile would be pretty much non-existent until he was deployed again.”

“He wasn’t a nice man,” I whisper, remembering the times Grayson had looked so sad when he’d come over to ours. I’d been just a little girl then, and Mom used to say that it was just his young adult mood whenever I questioned her about it. But I’d known different. I’d been able to see it in his eyes, and the times he’d come over with bruises on him, the sadness in them had been even more prominent.

“I remember the times you’d come over to ours and tell me you’d been in a fight. You never once told me it was your dad, but over time I’d learned the truth without the words falling from you.”

He nods. “Children should be seen and not heard in his eyes. Everything I did was wrong. Everything Mom did was even worse, and the day I stood up to him to protect her, I become his human punching bag. I guess at that point, I was the easier option for his excuses. It was easier to explain to people that my bruises were because I’d been in a brawl because I was young and stupid. He could hit me anywhere he wanted. With Mom, he had to hide the marks he inflicted on her. And as the years went on, her beautiful smile faded faster when she saw what he did to me. To us both.”

“Have you heard anything from him since?”

He shakes his head, the tension in his shoulders now back. “Nothing. I’ve no idea where he is, and I don’t care. He ripped this family apart in more ways than one. I never want to see him again because I won’t be able to hold myself responsible for my actions. He made her feel worthless while she was with him and made her believe she’d never cope without him. And she did believe that.”