Page 77 of Never Forever

“Has he been sick?” I asked, forcing his attention my way.

For a second I thought Matt wasn’t going to answer me. He’d grunt or just ignore me. But his eyes met mine and he nodded.

“When?”

“Do you want to stay or go to the hotel?”

“I want you to answer my question.”

He rubbed his hand over his face and into his hair like my questions were just so exhausting. That me standing here in this garage with his father waiting inside was almost more than he could take.

He walked to the door and then stopped. Just stopped. He didn’t turn to face me.

“About a year ago,” he said. “Thyroid cancer. He finished treatment a few months ago. That’s why he’s not in town much.”

“Cancer,” I whispered, letting the weight of the word settle over me. “He looks like he lost weight, too.”

“He did. And all his hair in the beginning.”

“It grew back all white,” I said with a sense of relief. “He looks like Santa now.”

“Don’t tell him that. He’s convinced he’s going to take over as Calico Cove’s Santa, but that’s a lot of kids to have sit on his lap.”

I reached out a hand to touch Matt’s arm, to get him to turn to me. Look at me.Talkto me. But I pulled it back. It would have been a stupid thing to do.

“You must have been scared.” Terrified was more like it. Patrick was everything to Matt.

Matt ducked his head, as much of a nod as I would get.

“One cup of tea,” he said firmly. “Don’t get chatty.”

17

Matt

Itold her the truth and not at all the truth. Dad did have cancer, he did go through treatment. The word we weren’t saying, because it would blow up everything was:

Again.

The adrenaline from sitting in this kitchen wondering what Dad might say made my skin crawl. Made me giddy and sick to my stomach. Having her in my Dad’s house made me want to bash my head against the wall.

My worry was useless. The two of them could chat for days about nothing. And Dad seemed hell bent on dissecting every moment of her career in the last ten years.

The tea turned quickly to whiskey, and one became two before I could stop it.

We sat around the kitchen table, the lamp casting its nice familiar glow over all of us. The dishwasher hummed in the background and the rain pattered against the windows.

I stood and pulled Dad’s Irish cheddar from the fridge. I put it on a plate with some probably stale crackers. They both ate it though. I cut up an apple, put that on the plate.

I watched quietly as Carrie answered questions about famous stars. Dad wanted to know who was nice and who was mean. She piled a piece of apple on a piece of cheese on a cracker and handed it to him. He ate it and she made one for herself.

I turned away and refused to get emotional. I refused to think about why that was so satisfying. Like feeding them was the most important thing I would do all day.

“Enough about me, I want to know more about how you’re doing,” Carrie said. “How are you feeling?”

“Right as rain. I’m totally fine,” Patrick said and waved her off.

“It’s not totallyfine.It’s thyroid cancer,” she said, her expression grim.