The Life We Almost Had Read online

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locals or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

  Copyright © 2017 by Laura Miller.

  LauraMillerBooks.com

  The Life We Almost Had

  All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means or stored in a database or retrieval system.

  Cover design by Laura Miller.

  Cover photo, title page photo (hands) © Jacob Lund/Fotolia.com.

  Cover photo, title page photo (rose petals) © janonkas/Fotolia.com.

  Second title page photo; quote pages photo; contents page photo; chapter headings photo; dedication page photo; and acknowledgments page photo (jar) © derbisheva/Fotolia.com.

  The End page photo, quote page photo (flower) © okalinichenko/Fotolia.com.

  Flower photo design by Laura Miller.

  Author photo © Neville Miller.

  To the Keeper of our days,

  For a love that lasts a lifetime.

  And to my mom,

  For teaching me to dream.

  Thank you, Mom.

  And to my dad,

  Who taught me how to drive a tractor, fix the sink, cut wood and change the oil. And for everything else, there’s duct tape.

  Thank you, Dad.

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  Prologue

  Chapter One: Just Promise Me

  Chapter Two: The Color of Rain

  Chapter Three: I Didn’t

  Chapter Four: Did You See?

  Chapter Five: Miss America

  Chapter Six: Does She Know?

  Chapter Seven: Berlin’s the Boy

  Chapter Eight: You

  Chapter Nine: Don’t Call Me Baby

  Chapter Ten: It’s the Long Hair

  Chapter Eleven: That First Cut

  Chapter Twelve: Angel’s Tree House

  Chapter Thirteen: Like the Boy

  Chapter Fourteen: He’s Wrong

  Chapter Fifteen: Your Place

  Chapter Sixteen: One Hundred

  Chapter Seventeen: Stay Broken

  Chapter Eighteen: I Can Do This

  Chapter Nineteen: You’re Home

  Chapter Twenty: I Saw Your Name

  Chapter Twenty-One: So Lucky

  Chapter Twenty-Two: You Need to Go

  Chapter Twenty-Three: The Time in Between

  Chapter Twenty-Four: You Have a Tattoo

  Chapter Twenty-Five: Did You Love Her?

  Chapter Twenty-Six: Saturday

  Epilogue

  Bonus: A Letter to Julia

  About the Author

  Also by Laura Miller

  I take her in.

  She is the breath, warming my soul.

  I taste her on my lips.

  She is the salt, consuming my tears.

  I feel her in my bones.

  She is the ache my heart craves.

  I repeat her name.

  Hers is the name forever on my tongue.

  She began as a dream.

  She ended at sunrise.

  The Life We Almost Had

  LAURA MILLER

  When our minds cannot,

  our hearts remember.

  Prologue

  My mother always said that a memory can get you through the rest of your life. So, that’s why I don’t know where to begin. Do I start at the beginning of my life or at the memory—where I believe my life might have actually begun?

  It’s been years, but I still think of him—just like I still think of that sleepy, little ghost town we both call home. But just like a memory, I guess, both that little town and that boy are now really more like a dream—one that disappears as soon as the morning sun comes slithering through the blinds. But true to a dream, I suppose, it always leaves something behind. And this dream always leaves behind a longing—for Sweet Home, but mostly, for him.

  I grew up in Sweet Home, Missouri. I don’t know if I’d call it sweet, necessarily, but it is home, to me. Today, it looks different than it used to. Today, grass grows up out of the cracks in the brittle sidewalks that line Market Street. A short twelve years ago, I used to wheel a roller dog my grandpa gave me down those same concrete walks with ease. And it’s not just the sidewalks. Tall water hemp covers the bases on the baseball diamond in the park. And now, nearly all the storefront windows have plywood boards covering up dark and dusty, empty rooms. And if that’s not enough, where there once were people from birth to ninety-nine spilling out of the old United Church of Christ every Sunday morning, now there’s a no trespassing sign on God’s big, wooden door.

  But back in its namesake years, Sweet Home was pretty sweet, I think. I’ve seen old pictures. And people lived in Sweet Home at one time. Happy people. Proud people. There were cars at the filling station and women buying yards of fabric in the general store. There were men along the street, laughing next to big cars and holding wide-eyed toddlers. Every little front yard had bright green grass that was meticulously cut. And all that green grass was fenced in with wrought iron, all the way down the street, each yard just like the last. And every little home along Market had an American flag that jutted out from some part of the house. And every other house had a rocking chair on a little front porch. And in every rocking chair on Sunday, just when the sun was sinking back into the earth, there would be an old man smoking a corncob pipe or a young woman rocking a baby.

  But I’m not too familiar with the Sweet Home of then or the one of today, really. The Sweet Home I knew wasn’t booming, but it wasn’t abandoned quite yet, either. The Sweet Home I knew was about the size of a tire valve cap, and all the people who lived inside that cap could be counted on three sets of fingers and toes. But people were happy, and the buildings still held some life.

  When I lived there, there was a bar and a post office and a fire station that we’d take cookies to every Christmas Eve. And there were still lights that lined the streets. Some perpetually flickered, but there were lights, all the same. Nearly every summer night we would dance on the asphalt under their light shows and pretend we were rich Hollywood stars.

  There weren’t many babies or kids, though. And except for me and the girl who lived across the street, there was no one else my age. The girl’s parents owned the only watering hole in town. She was quiet, and she mostly kept to herself, but we got along just fine. Her name was Angel. And I always thought it was a funny name. Angels glowed and wore halos. Angel did neither. But then there came a day when I changed my mind about that. Angel really was an angel—sent straight down from heaven above to save me—not once, but twice.

  The first time was around the year that we both turned eleven. Angel and I were playing hopscotch outside her parents’ bar, and a dirty old Nova pulled up to us and asked for directions to the nearest grocery store. Angel was her usual self and didn’t say a word, so I decided I’d have to tell him myself. He had long, scraggly hair and a crooked nose, but his eyes were kind. I told him how to get to the IGA, but he craned his neck and said he couldn’t hear a word I was saying. He said I’d have to come closer. So, I took a step toward his car, and that’s when Angel grabbed my arm and screamed louder than I’ve ever heard anybody scream before. I flinched, and my ears cracked. Angel had never spoken more than maybe ten soft words at a time in front of me, and here she was screaming loud enough to shatter that old bar’s glass windows. Within seconds, her momma came running out, and the car with the man in it sped away. And all that remained from that quick moment was the red imprint of Angel’s fingers on my forea
rm.

  Two days later, we heard through the grapevine that a guy in a dirty old Nova had tried to pull a young girl into his car in the next town over. She had managed to slink out of his grip—just about the same time that the man had slipped into the grip of the girl’s daddy. And that’s where that story ended—although, there are quite a few rumors that circulated, none of which ended too well for the man ... or his Nova.

  I never thanked Angel for saving me. I never really had the chance. The bar closed down the next day, and Angel and her family moved somewhere far away from Sweet Home.

  And that was not too long before the rest of the town left, too. Some said it was just time—time for everybody to go. But most said it was because the old hat factory had closed in Holstein, just east of town. It employed most of the people who were left in Sweet Home—those who didn’t make a living plowing dirt, like my daddy did.

  As for me and my momma and daddy, we stayed, though. We stayed in our little ghost town, where daddy drove back and forth all day in the fields, planting money, as he called it. And momma kept working part-time collecting antiques and selling them in a little booth down the road.

  And life was quiet—just like Angel had been—until the day that he showed up. And that’s actually the second time that Angel saved me. She moved out of that little house across the street, and he moved in. So, the way I see it, Angel gave me him.

  From that day and for a while after that, you couldn’t hear the sound of the water dripping in the kitchen sink or the branches scraping across the tin roof above my room anymore. Those sounds were all drowned out by the crack of Clearly Canadian caps hitting the concrete and his laugh and the high-pitched hum of an engine, as his dirt bike made little circles in the bottom land.

  That was all I heard, anyway.

  But eventually, he left, too. Everyone always left. And we—we just stayed. And in time, it got quiet again—just like Angel. But I still remember that little piece of moonlight he brought into my life. And that’s where I really feel as if my story begins. It begins with that boy I fell in love with, nearly seven years ago, back in Sweet Home, Missouri.

  Chapter One

  Just Promise Me

  Present

  Berlin

  “Berlin, remember you’re picking up Oliver from basketball practice tonight.”

  I nod my head and push in the chair so she doesn’t plow into it on her way to the door.

  “That’s still all right, right?” she asks, turning back to look at me.

  “Yeah, I’ve got him,” I say, my mouth full of buttered toast.

  “Good. And tomorrow, if you still can, Madeline needs help with her tornado project. And for some reason, no one can help her but you.”

  Still chewing, I lean back against the kitchen counter and fold my arms against my chest. “Because no one can make tornados like Uncle Berlin.”

  She stops shoving groceries into the pantry and glances up at me. Her look is thankful. I get that look a lot from her.

  “I’ll be here,” I assure her.

  “Thank you.” She says the words with a tired smile.

  “You don’t have to thank me, Elin. I’m your brother. Plus, I’m still just makin’ up for that time I superglued all your curling irons together ... and that one time I scrubbed the toilet with your toothbrush.”

  Her eyes cut to mine. “You didn’t.”

  I laugh out loud. “I didn’t,” I say, taking a seat in a kitchen chair. “I swear. I thought about it. But I didn’t do it.”

  She throws her hand to her hip but keeps her eyes trained on me. I don’t know if she believes me. But after a moment, her expression grows soft, and an audible sigh escapes her lips. “I just can’t imagine doing all this without you. Where would I be?”

  I shrug. “Well ...”

  “Don’t say it,” she warns, giving me a stern look.

  Elin married one of my good friends, who turned out to be a better friend than he was a husband. So, technically, without me, she probably wouldn’t have gotten so close to him. They’ve been divorced for two years now. They’re civil toward one another, and he’s still around—just not as much as I am, I guess. In all fairness, though, I did warn her. I told her not to date my friends. I even threatened her, but what I hadn’t quite figured out back then was that the moment something became off limits to Elin, that was the very moment she wanted it.

  Other than that, I can’t complain. I got it pretty easy in the sister department. She’s three years older than me, so for most of my life, she was too cool for school ... and me. But I did have friends, and she would let us play war games in the backyard when Mom and Dad made her babysit. And occasionally, when we were stuck in the house because of rain, she would stay up all night with me and play Battleship. And on rare occasions, she was good for throwing a baseball because she’s an Elliot, and Elliots are strong. So, in the end, I never really missed having a brother.

  “I know you think about her.”

  “What?” I look up to Elin staring at me.

  “Nah,” I say. “That’s not what I was thinking about.”

  “That would be a first.”

  I chuckle to myself. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  “But you do,” she says, kneeling down to pour some food into the dog’s bowl.

  “No, it’s not like that. I don’t think about her anymore.”

  She gives me a disbelieving look. I ignore it. “I don’t,” I lie.

  “Okay, then.” She stands up from her kneeling position and smoothes out the wrinkles in her sundress. “Then, I have this girl I want you to meet.”

  “No.”

  “Berlin, I really think you’d like her.”

  I shake my head.

  “You didn’t even give her a chance”

  “Still, no,” I say.

  “I knew it.” She sits down in one of the chairs across from me and crosses her arms.

  “What?” I ask.

  “That’s how I know you still think about her. You haven’t taken one girl seriously since her.”

  I meet her challenging gaze. “Oh, really?”

  She cocks her head to the side—the way she does when she thinks she’s right.

  “Maybe it’s just your selection of girls,” I say.

  She rolls her eyes, but I keep going.

  “Last spring. The cat lady,” I remind her.

  “You like cats.”

  “I’ve liked two cats,” I say. “Just two. That’s it.”

  She takes a long breath and then pushes out a sigh.

  “Or what about the girl who told me that I’d be hotter if I were a felon?” I ask her. “Or what about Justine?”

  “No.” She wags her finger at me. “Justine was not my fault. That was Natalie’s idea.”

  I rest my elbows on the table and cup my face into my hands.

  “Besides, how were we supposed to know she liked women?” she asks.

  “Well, her Facebook, for one.” I sit up and refit my cap over my head. “No one thought to look at her damn profile first?”

  “Well, you could have as well, mister.”

  “Well, that just goes to show how much I trust-ed you two.”

  She playfully rolls her eyes once more before standing and pushing in her chair. “It would also help if your name wasn’t a girl’s name.”

  A laugh gets stuck in my throat. “Yeah,” I say, nodding. “That might have helped, too. But you’ve gotta take that up with Mom.”

  She fights back a smile but keeps her hooded stare on me. I know she’s thinking up something. She’s got that look on her face again.

  “Just promise me,” she begs. “Promise me you’ll stop living in the past, Berlin. You were young. She was young. We were all young. But you don’t know where she is. And it’s not like she’s just gonna come walking up to you one day. And even if she did, she’s going to be a grown woman, who’s made choices ... that didn’t involve a little boy who she used to know fo
r a little while ... a long time ago.”

  I let her words sink in for a good minute. They hurt going in one ear, almost as much as they hurt going out the other. But I nod my head, like any good brother would do.

  “It’s the weekend. Go and have a little fun tonight. Okay?” she says.

  I meet her pleading, gray eyes.

  “Can you do that, for your big sis?”

  I can’t help but smile—even if it is hidden behind the bill of my cap. “I can do that ... but only for you.”

  She shakes her head in a scolding kind of way. “Thank you,” she says, placing her hand on my shoulder before walking out of the room.

  Chapter Two

  The Color of Rain

  Present

  Berlin

  I throw a hammer onto the truck bed and slam the tailgate shut.

  “What are you building now, Elliot?” Doug asks, pulling out his handkerchief. He’s standing under a big sign that reads: Channing, Kansas’ Number One Source for Lumber.

  It’s the only source for lumber, but who’s counting, I guess.

  I rest my stare on the two-by-fours he just helped me load into my truck.

  “Swing set ... for Elin’s kids.”

  “Man, you spoil those kids rotten.”

  A crooked grin edges across my face. “They’re not quite rotten, yet, so I’ve got a little bit more time.”

  Doug chuckles to himself. “Hey, when do I get to ride in your car?”

  “Never,” I say, squinting one eye at him.

  He makes some kind of snarling sound, and then he points a finger in my direction. “One of these days, I’m gonna ride in that car.”

  “I wouldn’t go bettin’ my last dollar on that,” I say.

  He laughs once more, and then he slowly saunters back into the lumber yard building.