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“It’s in Colorado,” Mom added, a tinge of desperation in her voice. I winced.
That got Dad’s attention, and dread pooled in my stomach as he looked up at her, and then turned his attention to me.
“What part of Colorado, Em?” His tone was light, but I already knew what he was thinking about. I didn’t want to tell him. I worked for an answer that was vague, but still truthful.
“A few hours from Denver. Mom, this salmon is incredible. Really moist and buttery, and?—”
“Which direction from Denver?”
Crap. He was interested now. “Southwest,” I said, the unease in me multiplying with every word. I realized I was going no matter what my father said or did. I’d decided independently, and I certainly didn’t need his permission. I just didn’t want his reaction to this news to make my mother’s already difficult situation even worse.
Dad squinted at me, then turned to Mom. “That’s where he is.”
There was emphasis on the word “he.” Because “he” was the villain in our family’s story.Hewas the enemy. And all bets were off. There was no not telling them now. I braced for impact.
“Yeah, actually, the conference is at the resort,” I said, trying to keep my tone nonchalant. Might as well rip the Band-Aid off all at once.
Dad dropped his fork and Mom stared at me.
“Dad—” I began, but he was already talking, his face reddening and his words coming fast.
Shit.
“You’re going to Kasper Ridge? You know he’s there. He runs the place. He’s up there, building his empire like nothing even happened, and you’re going to go there? Pay for a room? Help him go on like he’s not culpable for your brother’s death? How could you even imagine being in the same town as him?”
And there it was.
I swallowed hard but pushed down the misplaced guilt trying to swamp me. There were no right answers here, but I searched for something anyway.
“They decided it was an accident, Dad.” My voice wasn’t as strong as I’d have liked. My stomach tumbled and the food in front of me suddenly lost all appeal. I clutched my hands together in my lap as Dad pulled us back to the thing that defined us all now.
There’d been an investigation. The crash that killed my brother had been determined to be attributable to human error, but the other pilot hadn’t been held accountable because the error was partly Jake’s. It was bad luck, bad weather, bad decision making—a horrible combination of factors that had led to one man dying and another spending the rest of his life playing the devil in every one of my father’s waking moments.
“If it weren’t for him, your brother would be sitting here with us now.” Dad spit these words out. I couldn’t keep my eyes from drifting to the empty seat across the table from me. I wished Jake were here. But nothing we did would bring him back. We couldn’t stop living, and that knowledge was part of what had made me want to go to the conference even more when I discovered where it was.
There were no answers that would mollify Dad, so I didn’t offer any. Instead I picked up my fork again, and swallowed down the emotion that threatened to ruin my dinner. I took a deep breath, and ate my mother’s delicious salmon while both my parents pretended to eat, each of them drowning in their own sorrow and sadness.
As a family, we were stuck, mired in the moment none of us had actually lived, but which had changed everything. I was tired of it. I was tired of living every second in memory of my brother. It wasn’t what Jake would have wanted for us.
I put down my fork again, my stomach still not cooperating. I tried again. “Maybe if I meet him, talk to him, it will help,” I said, my voice gaining strength.
“Help with what, honey?” Mom asked, her eyes shining with years of grief.
“Help me move on,” I said, dropping my own fork. “Maybe it can help us all move on.” I looked between them. I’d never said these words to them, but I’d definitely thought about saying them, and maybe it was time. “Jake is gone, and we can’t bring him back. Living every day in his memory is one thing, but living every day in grief and sadness is not good for any of us.” I shook my head, looking back and forth between my parents. Each of them stared down, into their laps. Their faces looked older, tired, sapped of vitality. Neither of them looked at me, or at each other. It was like they were locked in plexiglass isolation booths, each of them suffering alone. Needlessly.
“Maybe if I meet this man, maybe if he becomes a real person in my head instead of some evil villain...maybe I’ll be able to forgive him and get past this. And if I can, maybe you’ll be able to someday.”
Dad’s head snapped up. “Forgive him? For killing your brother?”
“Gabe,” Mom said, her voice a plea.
“There is no forgiveness. He took a life, Emily!” This was what I dreaded. Dad was getting agitated, his hands shaking, his face reddening. He was jury and judge, and it didn’t matter what any actual court had decided, he couldn’t see past it. My heart literally ached inside me as I looked at him. How many times could we have this conversation and have it never go anywhere new?
“It was an accident, Dad. It could just as easily have been Jake who survived, and this guy, Archie Kasper, who died.”
“If only it had been,” Dad said. His pain had gotten in the way of his humanity since the moment he’d learned the details of the accident. My father had once been the kindest, most generous man I knew. But now...things had changed.
“Don’t say that, Gabe. We wouldn’t wish this on any other family...”
