He smiles at me as we walk over to my parents’ graves. I’m oddly nervous as we round the corner. The last couple of days have been tough. I’ve had the worst headaches as I tried my best to make sense of all the memories I lost, grief hitting me as though it was fresh all over again. It’s hard to grieve a person the world seems to have forgotten, but at least Silas was there for me, holding me each time it got too hard. I spent many nights crying myself to sleep, my heart breaking not just over the loss of my father and the choice he made, but also everything Silas and I lost, everything I put him through. The guilt has been hard to stomach, and though he’s tried his best to reassure me, I can’t shake the remorse I feel.
“Mom, Dad,” I murmur, my eyes roaming over their spotless tombstones. “This is Silas, and you would have really loved him. I’d introduce him to you as my boyfriend, but that doesn’t seem like quite enough to describe what he means to me.”
Silas wraps his arms around me, his touch comforting. I lean into him, my heart breaking all over again.
“I suppose you’ve seen him throughout the years, haven’t you? He’s taken better care of you than I could at the time.” Silas maintained my parents’ graves in my absence, ensuring the tombstones were kept clean and going as far as having flowers delivered weekly. I don’t know what I did to deserve him, but I’m going to spend the rest of my life repaying him for everything he’s done for me.
“Dad,” I whisper. “He’s the one who saved your truck. Remember when I told you that I had to sell it? Silas bought it back for you, and he’s taken really good care of it. If not for that beloved truck of yours, I might still be living as a shell of myself, feeling like I’m incomplete. In the end, it was both Silas and you that saved me, in more ways than one.”
I stare at the tombstones in front of me, feeling conflicted. “I’m still mad at both of you. Every day, I still wonder if there’s anything I could’ve done, or something I should have said. Some days I wonder if maybe I just wasn’t enough for you, Mom. And Dad? I still feel like I failed you. Doing what you did, making me give you up in return for money? The fact that you even considered it at all makes me wonder how terrible of a daughter I must have been for you to think that’s something I could live with.” I sniff as fresh tears roll down my face. I’ve been crying most days since I regained my memories, but it’s been bittersweet. The past might hold a lot of pain, but it holds just as much love. “The man you hired… he upheld his end of the bargain as best as he could, even after all of your plans fell apart. He paid for my education, Dad. If not for Silas, I’d never have known, and I figured… I figured telling you that would help you rest easier. I wish you’d never done it, but you should know it wasn’t all in vain.” I inhale shakily and run a hand through my hair. “I’m hurt, and I’m angry, but I still love you. I still miss you, and there still isn’t anything I wouldn’t do to see both of you one more time.”
Silas raises our joined hands to his lips and kisses the back of my hand, his expression pained. “Per aspera ad astra,” he tells me. “I know it hurts, and you don’t have to forgive them immediately, but don’t let the pain poison you, Ray. This, too, is one of the hardships that turned you into the person you are today. You and I have been immersed in misery, but because of and despite it, we’ve come as far as we did. Through adversity, we reached the stars.”
I nod and smile up at him. He’s right, of course. He always is. “I’m not sure who I would be without you, Si. Adversity may have shaped us, but love did, too. I love you, Silas Sinclair. Today, and every day to come.”
The way he smiles at me has my heart racing as we walk over to his parents’ tombstones. “I had my father’s ashes buried next to mother,” he tells me as we pause in front of them. “So they could be together at last. A few years ago, I found out that my father had purchased the plot next to mother, much like your father did. This was my way of honoring the wish he never voiced.”
I hold his hand as Silas greets his parents before turning to me. “This is the woman I’m going to marry,” he says, and my heart skips a beat. “I’ve already asked her to marry me, but she thought I was joking. I wasn’t. It’s okay though, I’ll try again, and again, until she says yes. Her name is Alanna, but I call her Ray. Sometimes, when she’s acting a little crazy, I call her my little psycho. She’s sweet and smart and beautiful, and you would have loved her so much.”