Page 29 of The Last Thing You Said

I love to be out on the lake. Between my dad’s boat and the Porters’, I spent much of my childhood summers fishing and sunning myself on the pontoon. I love everything about it—the bright sun reflecting off the water, the smell of fish and gasoline, wildflowers and weeds, sweet coconut sunscreen. I love the breeze that cools my baking skin, blows my hair back as we speed across the lake. The coolness of the water, murky with pondweed and coontail. The endless shoreline of jack pines and cabins and docks.

For a few minutes, I close my eyes, feel the warm morning sun on my face. I tip my head back and pretend that this is before. Trixie is here with us, and Clayton maybe, or Guthrie, and Ben is at the helm, like he is now, but it’s the old Ben, before he became so angry and cold. It’s my Ben.

“Lucy,” Emily says, and I open my eyes. “How did Trixie die?”

My breath catches. Ben’s head snaps up.

“Emily, I don’t—I’m not sure that . . . today—” I can’t think straight. I can’t think of a way to talk about this, especially in front of Ben.

And then he’s right next to her, taking her hand. “Hey,” he says, and his voice cracks. “You know this. Trixie’s heart was sick. She went for a swim and her heart stopped working.”

He’s so calm, so gentle, and I can’t speak. I’m not ready for this. She’s too young to really understand. But he told her enough.

Emily turns to me. “Is my heart sick? Will it stop working?”

“Oh, no,” I say. I kneel in front of her and put my arms around her, even though now I’m right next to Ben. “You shouldn’t worry about that, sweetheart. What happened to Trixie doesn’t happen to everyone.”

“Were you there, Lucy?” she says. She pulls away from me and looks at Ben. “Were you?”

I nod, but I don’t look at Ben.

“Hey, I thought you wanted to catch some fish,” he says, and thank God, it distracts her. Her face, so sad a minute before, breaks into a huge smile.

She grabs my hand and pulls me up from my crouching position. “You fish, too.”

“No, that’s okay,” I say, and it’s all I can do to hold back a sob.

“No!” she says with more force. “I want you to fish with me. Ben, tell her that you’ll teach her how to fish.”

Ben doesn’t need to teach me how to fish. I knew how to bait a hook before I could write my own name.

“Okay, I’ll fish with you,” I say.

She scrambles up to a seat in the bow and swings her legs back and forth. To join her I have to pass very close to Ben. I hold my breath. When he steps up to the bow, he hands me a rod and reel and for the briefest second, his fingers touch mine. I don’t mean to, but I jerk away like I’ve been shocked.

He doesn’t move. He’s so close. He must surely hear how loudly my heart pounds against my rib cage.

He leans toward me, and for a split second I have this insane thought that he is going to kiss me, right here, standing in the Crestliner in the middle of Halcyon Lake.

“Lucy?” he says in a low voice. “Are you okay?”

I nod. And then it’s over. He looks away.

“I’ll help Emily if you don’t need me, then.”

She squeals when he hands her a worm, bounces on her toes when her line gets a bite, and Ben helps her reel in a tiny bluegill.

I will always need him.

I sit in the bow and cast again and again, watch the bobber, wait for something. Anything.

16 · Ben

Later that morning, after I bring Lucy and Emily back to shore, I find Tami in the garden, kneeling in a row of tomato plants.

“Hey,” I say.

She looks up. “Hi.”