The taste of forbidden

8. Closeness. [Part 3]

"Why haven’t you left?" I ask, matching her position, which makes my arm almost brush against hers. The difference in our skin tones is jarring. While my arms are tanned from the sun, her white skin is flawless, without a single mark or imperfection.

She, as usual, doesn’t answer my question, but this time she doesn’t have her walls up, nor does she seem emotionally shut down, she’s just lost in thought, staring at the landscape with absent eyes.

I have an idea of what she’s imagining.

"When Lucas didn’t know how to swim yet, I used to bring out an inflatable pool for him—you know, those colorful ones that deflate with any little bump?" I say while laughing, remembering how often I had to patch the damn thing. "I’d set it up right there," I point toward the spot where Lucas and I used to play.

"Really?" I hear the smile in her voice.

"He loved splashing water on me... I can still hear his laughter in my mind, like it happened just yesterday."

"That must be a nice memory."

I nod, still smiling.

"Later, he found a little spring down south, just that way," I point again, "that became his favorite spot to swim."

"I know it."

Her words take me by surprise, and I turn to her with a silent question in my eyes.

She glances at me when she adds, "Lucas left me a letter. He mentioned the lake in it."

It’s not a lake—it’s more like a small spring—but I don’t correct her. I’m too shocked she knows the place.

"And you’ve been there?"

"Yeah, I’ve been."

I don’t try to hide my surprise. You can reach it quickly on horseback, but on foot it takes more than an hour.

"Is that where you go every morning?" I guess.

"Yeah."

"Alone?"

She gives me a look full of irony, like there could be any other answer.

She has no friends here. No one wants her around.

"Lia, you’re not familiar with this land, or the climate—how the hell do you even get there?"

She shrugs while I stare at her. I try to find a clue that she’s spent the last few mornings under the sun, but her skin is still flawless.

"I stole one of your hats," she seems to guess what I’m thinking, "and I have good sunscreen."

"You’re the reason my hats keep disappearing?"

"I can pay you for them."

I laugh, catching the humor in her voice.

She’s a little brat.

We fall into a calm silence for a few minutes until she says, "I like working with the horses nearby. It gives me peace. That’s why I was hiding earlier."

"Yeah?" I whisper.

"Is that weird?"

I think about it for a moment. I think about how introverted she is, how quiet she seems, how noise and attention seem to make her uncomfortable… So no, it doesn’t seem weird at all.

I pull a piece of straw from my pocket and trap it between my lips, playing with it before shaking my head.

She laughs, the sound echoing in the empty landscape.

"What?" I ask.

"That," she points to the straw in my mouth, "so typical of a cowboy."

"Don’t knock it if you haven’t tried it."

"No, thanks."

"Alright," I let it go, looking at the landscape again.

I want to ask more about that letter, I even want to read it myself, but the truth is I can’t. I haven’t earned her trust, I haven’t treated her well enough to demand anything, so I hold back and shut up because I have no right to something so private to her.

"You’re the reason Lucas wants his ashes scattered here."

Her words hit me hard, knocking the air out of my lungs so suddenly.

"Yeah?" I blink, not daring to look at her, not daring to ask for more.

"Becket, your brother loved you," she says softly. "Yeah, he only mentioned you once and it was in that letter. But that was more than enough to know he loved you. He asked me to bring him here, to you. That was his last wish."

I run a hand over my jaw and turn my face, finding her gentle eyes when I admit, "It’s... hard to believe."

"That he’d want to be with you?"

I nod, because yeah, f**k, it’s hard to believe after everything that happened.

"Lucas was really angry when he left. I lost track of him... but that’s what he wanted, Lia."

I had to pay a fortune for a private investigator to find him. And he was found, but almost a year after he left and in another f*****g continent. The first few years I tried to contact him, send him money, but Lucas seemed too determined to leave this life behind. And I just... I guess I gave up. The last I heard of him was his wedding, nearly five years ago.

My brother was practically a kid when he left. He was only eighteen. I was already twenty-nine. I could’ve easily taken a plane and gone to find him.

"I gave up too fast," I whisper, the kindness in her green eyes pulling the words out of me. "I should’ve looked harder."

She nods, because we both know I f****d up.

Lucas was thirty when he died, and twelve of those years he was completely cut off from me. It hurts even more to remember it was fourteen years for me if I count the two years I didn’t even know he was dead.

Just a month ago I couldn’t have imagined that my brother’s life ended at thirty. In my mind, he was thirty-two and happy with his wife.

I don’t see myself getting over that anytime soon.

"But Lucas could’ve contacted you too," she reminds me. "So the blame for that lack of communication, for that lack of contact, falls on both of you, Becket, not just you."

"I’m the older brother."

"So what?" she whispers, searching my eyes patiently. "You’re his brother, not his father. You know that, right?"

I look away when the conversation becomes too much... the honesty is too intimate for who we are.

"f**k," I growl under my breath, biting the straw again, this time harshly.

"He asked me to let him go when I’m ready," this time it’s her who makes a vulnerable confession, "but I can’t. Not yet."

So that’s why she’s still here… she still refuses to let him go.

Two years. Two f*****g years and her pain is still so palpable.

How can she keep going with all that weight on her shoulders?

Because there’s more pain there, more than she lets on, and that makes her inner strength something even harder to ignore.

She’s going to fight for this land.

Lia’s never going to back down.

"You can stay as long as you want," I begin.

"I didn’t know I needed your permission," she immediately goes on the defensive.

"Lia, I’m not trying to start a fight, I just..." f**k, why is this so hard? Why won’t she let me antagonize her the way I want to? That would make all this s**t so much easier. "I understand why you’re here, I understand your position, but understand mine... I can’t hand over half of my land, half of my life, to a stranger."

Not after everything it’s cost me, after everything I’ve lost by holding on to it.

"I can sign a document where I make it clear that all decisions about the property will be made by you alone. I won’t have any power over any of it."

"Lia, no..." I shake my head, because it’s not just about that.

Besides, I know how easy it is to break an agreement. And even if I trust this Lia, I don’t trust future Lia. I can’t know what she’ll want later. She can’t guarantee me anything—not really—and that’s what keeps me from giving in.

She’s too young. She’ll remarry, she’ll have kids, she’ll build a family that might inherit something that doesn’t f*****g belong to them.

I grip the railing hard, shattering our brief moment of peace as I say, "There’s too much at stake for me... I’m sorry, but I can’t."

"And I can’t give you more, Becket," her voice has hardened, and I can almost feel the loss of the gentleness and kindness she offered just minutes ago. "Don’t ask me to give this up, to give up the only thing I have left of him, because I won’t do it."

With those words said, she turns around, grabs her laptop, and leaves.

[3/3]