“Do you think you’ll get everything finished before Summerfest?” Natalie sat up on the couch and looked at her brother.
“I’d better because I promised Keely I would.” See what happens when people depend on him? Why do they do that?
Hunt leaned back against the couch and put his feet on the old trunk his sister used as a feet-allowed coffee table. “Where are the boys?”
“Sally Hansen invited them over for dinner and a movie.”
“That’s a nice break for you.”
“It might be a nice break, but now I feel obligated to have her three boys over one evening.” Natalie sighed. “I don’t know where I will find the time or the energy to reciprocate.”
“I can help you with that, you can’t do everything on your own.” Not that she should be depending on him, either.
“You’re doing enough to help me as it is.” Natalie leaned forward and stretched. “I’m starving. I’m going to make a sandwich, you want one? I’ve got some leftover meatloaf.”
“Sounds good.”
Natalie went to the kitchen and he could hear her rattling around in there. He was tired but restless, and stood to wander around the room. He stopped by the bookshelf and ran his finger along the titles. The yearbook from the year he and Kevin had graduated caught his eye. He pulled it from the shelf and slowly opened it, not knowing if he really wanted to see the memories it held. A piece of paper fell out of the book and he leaned over to pick it up.
Kevin’s handwriting. He still recognized it. He started reading the note before he even realized it must be for his sister.
Natalie came into the room right at the moment. “What are you doing?” Her eyes were wide in alarm.
“I just pulled out the yearbook to look at it. This note fell out. I’m sorry… I guess it’s for you.”
“I know what it is. Give it to me.” Natalie put down the tray of sandwiches and held out her hand. “You had no business reading that.”
“I just started reading, I didn’t know…”
Natalie’s voice got quiet. “He didn’t want anyone to know. He wrote that note when he got sick, I guess he thought I’d find it after he was gone. But I found it before… before he died. So we talked about it, but he made me promise to never, ever tell anyone.”
“He kept that secret all these years?”
“Yes, and he asked me to try to help out the Grangers as much as I could.”
“Okay, explain to me exactly what happened.”
“Katherine’s accident was Kevin’s fault.” Natalie’s words came out slow and her voice held such pain. “Kevin said he was out driving that night, coming home late from work. He started to fall asleep at the wheel and swerved into the other lane. He saw a car veer to miss him, but when he looked in his rear view mirror, he thought the other car was okay. He drove on home and went to bed. The next day he left to go to Maine for the summer to stay with his uncle. When he got back, he heard about the accident. Katherine was in the hospital with something like her third surgery.”
“He’s sure it was her?”
“He said it was a blue car. Her dad’s car was that old blue Chevy, remember? It was totaled in the accident.”
“I remember after the accident Keely gave her father the car she’d saved up all through high school to buy and take with her to college.”
“Kevin never said a word to anyone but of course he blamed himself. I realized, after we talked, that’s why he was always helping out at the cafe. Fixing things for them. I thought he just felt sorry for them after Keely’s father died. I guess it was his way to help pay back for what he’d caused.”
“He never said a word to me.” Hunt sat musing. He thought Kevin told him everything. They’d been best friends back then. He remembered how Kevin had changed that fall, became more serious.
“I think it ate on him all the time. I would sometimes see this haunted look in his eyes when he thought I wasn’t watching. He did become a different person after that summer. I thought he’d just grown up. But I think the whole ordeal made him become the super responsible person he became. I even think—though I know he loved me—that he married me out of some weird sense of responsibility to you. You were leaving to travel the world, and I was here alone. He wanted to take care of me for you.” Natalie snatched a tissue and dabbed at the tears that slowly rolled down her cheek.
“Kevin loved you.”
“I know he did. I do. But I think part of it was again, paying for his sins.”
“You can’t think like that, sis. I know he was nuts about you.”