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He doesn’t say anything, just pats the back of the chair in a silent request for me to take that seat, before stepping back inside. I do, my tired body practically melting against the warm surface. I yawn, rubbing a hand across my eyes. I shouldn’t have taken that nap, probably. Even though I was flagging hard, it’ll only make sleeping tonight even more difficult. Tired now doesn’t equate to falling asleep later.

Something cold presses against my arm, and I jolt, looking over my shoulder at Shiloh. I hadn’t heard him approach, his socked feet quiet on the wood.

“Sorry,” he apologizes, still holding a beer out to me as he sits. I take it from him, making a production of looking at the label so I don’t have to look at him.

“Thanks. Local brand?”

“Mm,” he agrees, before allowing the quiet to overtake us once more.

Instead of taking a drink, I lift the bottle and press it to my cheek. The cool feels nice against my feverish skin. I used to be so much braver as a kid. Younger me would be astoundedto find out that adult me is nervous about doing something as simple as talking to Shiloh. Anxiety came nipping along at depression’s heels, though, and left me with little bravery and an overabundance of worry. It was those worries that drove me here in the first place, once my creative block started feeling less like something I might get over and more like the end of the world. I couldn’t paint, and so I would worry about not painting, which then ensured that I was too worked up to fucking paint. This, sitting here with Shiloh, the sun peeking over the house and the ocean in the distance, should be peaceful. It shouldn’t have my pulse jumping and a nervous tic bouncing my leg up and down. It shouldn’t scare me.

But it does, because even with seven years of distance stretched between us, Shiloh is the only person alive whose opinion matters to me. I suppose that’s another thing I need to explain to him. How fear of criticism—fear of being perceived—had made me pull away from calling him. With every piece I finished, every exhibition, every gallery opening I attended, all I could think about was what he might think. People would praise me and post about me on social media and pay a lot of money for something I made; somehow, all that did was make me more paranoid about the single opinion I cared about. It built itself up in my mind like a wall, and even today, it’s not one I’ve managed to break through.

Again, all I’ve done is punish him for something he didn’t even do. Pushed him away for no solid, explainable reason and left him behind in an effort to keep myself safe. I’m not sure what it says about my fucked-up brain that it decided Shilohwas the threat. Shiloh, who has never caused me pain in his life and would likely be incredibly hurt to know I thought it was a possibility.

I sigh, shifting in my seat, and take a sip of the beer. Not enough alcohol to provide liquid courage, but I suppose it’s better than nothing. Looking over, I catch Shiloh’s eyes already on my face. He turns away quickly, embarrassed to have been caught staring.

“Shi,” I start, but he cuts me off softly.

“You never got the emails I sent, did you?”

I sigh again, closing my eyes for a brief moment of dark. After a second, I tell him, “No. I don’t run any of the administrative side of things. I didn’t even know the log-in information.”

He huffs another one of his throaty laughs—the kind that are born in the chest but don’t quite make it out.

“Okay,” he agrees, accepting it as simply as that. It’s my turn to laugh, although I can’t seem to inject any hilarity into the sound. I merely sound sad.

“Listen, Shi. I know I apologized before, but I don’t feel like either of us took it very seriously, and I really do think I need to have a better go of it. I did get the emails—I read them through last night—but I didn’t get them when you sent them, which doesn’t make me any less sorry. I didn’t mean to ignore you, but I also didn’t reach out myself, so is there really a difference? I’m sorry for it either way.”

“I just thought you were busy,” he explains, shrugging. “My mom told me you needed space after the funeral, and even if she hadn’t, I’d already puzzled that out for myself. You weren’t thesame after your mom died, not that anyone would have expected you to be. You needed to be alone.”

He shrugs again, takes a pull from his beer, and aims his blue eyes toward the ocean. Alone. It’s an interesting thing to be lonely and still want company, to reach for people and then wish they’d stayed away once you have them. I had wanted to be alone, and I’d spent every minute of that alone time wishing I didn’t have to be. People came, and I’d wished they’d go; people would go, and I’d wished they had stayed. Daniel once told me that when we first met, I’d reminded him of a stray dog—eyes pleading for a home and teeth ready to bite anyone who tried to give me one. I have no idea what compelled the man to stick it out.

“And what did you need?” I ask Shiloh, because every fiber of my being knows how selfish heartbreak can make a person. We were suffering together, even though I felt alone, and this is the outcome: a single chair on a porch and someone I’ve spent my entire life loving thinking I was too busy for him.

“Oh, you know me. I just go on.”

Yes. Of course he did. He’s the rock the waves break around, and I didn’t have the sense to use him for shelter from the storm.

“You read the emails?” he asks softly. So softly that I barely hear the words before the breeze pulls them away.

“All of them. Including the last one,” I confirm.

“Well…that’s embarrassing.”

I smile at him, heart pattering a delighted rhythm when he turns his head and returns it. He was so angry last night, and even when I first answered the door and he looked at me, Icould see a lingering annoyance on his face. I can’t find it now.I just go on.

“It’s not,” I correct. There is nothing less embarrassing than those emails. “They were nice. I wish I’d been able to read them when you sent them.”

“Would you have replied?”

“I hope so.”

He doesn’t respond to that, nor do I expect him to. Nothing much to be said. Neither of us can say what might have happened if things had taken a different turn all those years ago. All we can do is move forward with how they are now.

“I don’t really want to go into details if it’s all the same to you, but my head wasn’t right after Mom died. I got so…sick, and instead of just sitting down and confronting it all, I poured everything into work,” I continue, moving the conversation onto the shakier ground I know we need to walk. I don’t know how else to explain my need to hide from him other than to give him all of the facts, as scary as that might be. It’s time to give him the benefit of the doubt. “It wasn’t just Mom, though. It was you.”

There is a soft chime as Shiloh startles and his beer bottle hits the wooden armrest of his chair. I can feel his eyes on the side of my face, but I don’t look over. The blue of the ocean is a safer view than the blue of his eyes when one is about to peel back the layers of their soul for inspecting.