Luke squeezed his eyes shut and pushed his thumbs into the sockets until he saw stars. She fucking killed him sometimes with her old “you weren’t the one who stayed” schtick, like he hadn’t been in the military for ten years before he met her. Like Sam didn’t have a farmer’s conference in Nashville years ago and went back every other month until he convinced Charlie to move up here with him. Like he somehow knew Charlie before Sam, like it was a [i]choice[/i] to “leave” or “hide” or “abandon.” Besides, he wasn’t convinced that if he’d met Charlie first, then she wouldn’t have fallen in love with Sam anyway. Because she did love him. He saw it every time he came home in the last goddamn five years. Right in front of his face. Wedding shit, baby talk, renovation dreams. When he heard their bedframe hitting the wall before dawn, he’d get up early and muck out stalls in the dark. Maybe they had more sex whenever Luke had a weird tension snap with Charlie, like when he brought home a girl from the bar last year and he had to hear about how “this isn’t a hotel” for a week straight. Maybe he was making it up. Some fucking choice.

When he opened his eyes, he somehow seemed even more tired. He ran his tongue along the inside of his teeth and shook his head. “Jesus Christ, Charlie, give me a break. You know that’s not what I mean. Do you think I erased Matty? Our mom, our dad? Huh? Any of the dozens of guys I’ve seen killed in the desert?”

He plucked her wedding photo off the fridge, tossed it on the island, and pointed. “He loved you, to hell and back. I’ve never seen him care about someone more, I fucking swear to God. And when you love someone like that – ” His voice got quiet and his jaw tightened. “When you love someone like that,” he repeated, “it never goes away. You don’t forget it. You don’t get over it. It stays with you, forever.”

Luke took some steps away from her, having gotten too close during his monologue, and he turned his back while he checked the stove. Not done yet. He put the lid back on, a little too forcefully. “A part of you will always belong to him,” he said to the backsplash behind the oven. Even the spices she had stacked along the top of it were dusty. “I promise.”

As he willed dinner to finish cooking, he got a club soda from the fridge. He wanted a drink more than life itself, but lately alcohol only just highlighted everything he was feeling. And he sure as hell didn’t want to feel more of it. Three hours back in the house, and he’d already told Charlie to sell and to hurry up and get over her dead husband because he found it depressing. Luke stared at the pot on the stove. He wasn’t going to burn dinner on top of it.