Page 65 of The Wedding Fake
“Because of the memories.” It wasn’t a question. If there was anyone in the world who understood how I felt, it was Amy. And yet she stayed in Cranberry Falls. “It gets better, Hud, if you let it.”
A week ago I wouldn’t have believed her, but in the past few days I’d made new memories in Cranberry Falls. My mind drifted to Claire, as it had at every opportunity over the past eighteen hours. And then the irony hit me—and I almost laughed out loud—because now Claire was just one more painful memory.
“My mom told me you were getting married,” I said, needing a new topic.
Amy looked down at her sandwich, then back up at me. She’d barely eaten. Needing something to do, I took another bite. “Are you angry?” she asked quietly.
I hadn’t expected her to be quite so blunt, and I wasn’t sure of the answer. I didn’t like it, but was I angry? “No,” I replied. “It’s just…hard. Do I know him?”
When she looked down at her sandwich this time she didn’t look up again, a sure sign I knew the man she was marrying. I braced myself. If I was sure of anything, it was that Lawrence would’ve wanted Amy to move on and be happy. “It’s Mike Kramme.”
I clenched my teeth, fighting the rage that roiled in my stomach. “Mike Kramme from our company?” Mike had been a couple years older than Lawrence, and though he’d worked a different shift from the two of us, he’d worked Engine 416, same as Lawrence.
Amy looked up, challenging me to reply, and I inhaled deeply. “How’d you meet?”
She snorted softly. “At the grocery store. I didn’t know he was a firefighter, or I wouldn’t have given him the time of day.”
I nodded, knowing I should say something more, or give her my blessing like Mom wanted, but I couldn’t speak—didn’t know what I would say, and I took a bite of my sandwich to fill the void.
“Do you think I want you to be unhappy?” Amy asked, surprising me out of my thoughts.
“No,” I answered automatically.
“Mike asked me to marry him almost a year ago, but I said no, because I thought you’d be upset.”
“Amy—” I protested.
“I felt like you’d given up so much, and if I moved on and was happy, it wouldn’t be fair to you.”
“I want you to be happy, Amy,” I said, but the words didn’t have the emotion I knew they should.
“Do you feel like that, Hudson, like if you’re happy you’re betraying everyone who loved Lawrence?”
Anxiety snaked through me, cold and oppressive. Of course I felt like that, but it wasn’t something you said out loud. I wasn’t going to martyr myself on Lawrence’s memory.
“I know you do,” she replied before I could answer.
“It was my job to save him,” I said through gritted teeth.
“No, it wasn’t. You had an order to pull out. Lawrence shouldn’t have turned back.”
I shook my head, my teeth clenched so tight my ears rang. “He turned back to save that boy.”
“The boy died,” she said softly. But I knew that. Of course I knew that. “And Lawrence died, and it was a miracle they were able to get to you, Hud. The three men who pulled you out had families.”
“Stop. I know that shit,” I demanded. She was telling me like the guilt didn’t eat at me every damn day.
“I loved Lawrence with every fiber of my being. I still love Lawrence,” she said, and the tears burned at the backs of my eyes, just as they had this morning. “And I knew him better than anyone on Earth.”
Not better than me. My jaw ticked.
“Except maybe you. You knew him,” she said, as if she could read my damn thoughts—probably because they were written all over my face. “So you know as well as I do how impulsive he could be. How reckless. How much he lived for the adrenaline high.”
“He was a good firefighter,” I gritted out.
“He was,” she agreed. “But he made a bad call, and that’s not your fault. No one blames you.”
I did. I blamed myself every minute of every day. “Amy—” I choked out, but I didn’t know what more to say. I wanted her to stop talking.