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Chapter Twenty-Five


Kevin

”You helped fix my screw up, man, I owe you,” Nick said. He had cornered me in the reception hall at his wedding. Lauren at his side, clutching his arm. “You need to go to Kentucky to win Caroline back. And I wanna help, if I can.”

“We want to go to Kentucky with you. Tomorrow.” Lauren added.

“But… your honeymoon,” I said, blinking in surprise.

Nick shrugged, “We can do it anywhere.” Lauren giggled. “You know what I mean, babe,” he said turning to her. He turned back to me, “Ain’t she kinky?” Leave it to Nick to find a gal as dirty in the brain as he was, I thought. “But seriously.”

“I don’t know,” I said, casting my eyes to the floor. Nick for some reason was still running around barefoot. His toes poked out from the bottom of his off-the-rack tux that was slightly too long in the ankle for him. “I don’t even know what I’d say to her.”

“Well you got all night to think it up,” Nick answered. “You love her, don’t you?”

I nodded, looking back up at him, “Yes,” I replied. It might’ve taken twenty-something years to get to the point that I knew that again, but I did, with a reverence that filled me top to bottom. I felt like one of those glow-in-the-dark light sticks - I’d been snapped in half by the events of the day, something inside me had been broken by signing those papers, but now the stuff inside me was free and glowing fluorescently.

“Then that’s what you need to tell her,” Lauren said urgently.

“But I told her that at the airport,” I said.

“Then you gotta tell her somehow that’s
special,” Lauren replied.




I shook the can of spray paint vigorously and pulled the cap off it. Red paint shot out of the nozzle and onto the wall as I moved my hand through the curve of the missing letters.

V - I - N - L - O - V - E - S - C - A - R - O - L - I - N - E, I wrote with a flourish, finishing the job that we’d started years ago.

I stepped back, paint on my hands and my clothes, and surveyed the handiwork. Finally, it was completed, and I hoped she’d see the poetic gesture I was trying to make here, that she’d see the meaning in it that I saw. I wanted to finish what we’d started.




”You know she’s gonna ask where you at, dawg,” Nick was saying as we checked in at LAX for our flight to Louisville. “What do we say when she asks?”

“Tell her I went apartment hunting. That’s what I was gonna do if I’d stayed in LA,” I said.

Lauren looked profoundly relieved.

We’d gotten two rental cars when we landed. Two because I’d planned to stay in Irvine for a piece after Nick and Lauren left. They followed me down the back roads of Kentucky closer and closer to home. I stopped at an Ace Hardware a couple towns away, paranoid we might bump into her and ruin the surprise. And then it was off to the camp, where I parked by the sign as Nick and Lauren drove the rest of the way up.

So they weren’t
really lying when they said I wasn’t with them. I wasn’t, really.

I’d waited at the end of the driveway until Caroline had taken the golf cart off to the cabins with Lauren and Nick and then I’d driven up and parked behind the car they’d rented. I popped the trunk and grabbed the bag from Ace, withdrawing one of the two cans of spray paint and the note I’d written and the flowers. I glanced nervously in the direction of the trail, leading off into the woods, and quickly arranged the stuff on the step, spreading some of the petals around and capturing the note beneath the weight of the can so the wind couldn’t carry it away.

I took a step back and surveyed the scene before running back to the car and driving away.

Meet me by our heart under the bridge. - K

That’s all I’d written.





I was still admiring the finally completed heart when I heard car tires on the gravel overhead on the road. I cocked my head, listening close. The car door opened and closed up above and I tossed the spraypaint can at the bag I’d pulled it from. I could hear the advance from the crunching gravel and crackling twigs along the side of the bridge, descending the hill, and with all my might I prayed it wouldn’t be Michael Spornacki that rounded the corner.

And for once my prayers were answered.

Caroline stepped around the edge of the bridge, clutching the note I’d left on the porch in one hand, a wide-eyed look of confusion on her face. She came to a stop, staring at me.

“Oh my God,” she whispered. “You’re here.”

I can’t blame her, being surprised as she looked. I was almost just as surprised to be there as she was to find me.

“I’m here,” I answered.

She bit her lips, still staring at me, like she didn’t know what to say. I wished I could read minds. I’d have done anything at that moment to know what she was thinking. I stood really still, like movement could scare her off like a deer or something. Then she noticed the graffiti on the wall. She gasped and turned to it, her palm outstretched. The paint dripped a little bit from the letters I’d added. She touched the wall beside the heart, her eyes roaming over it, taking it in. “You finished it,” she whispered.

“It needed finishin’,” I answered.

Caroline touched the letters, red paint getting onto her fingers like it was on mine, and she turned to me. “I’m sorry I ran off on you at the airport, I needed some time to think. A lot happened in a little time and I just felt so… overwhelmed by it all.” She rubbed her fingers together. “You understand, don’t you?”

“I do,” I replied. “And I’m sorry I overwhelmed you like that.”

“Did you make it back to the wedding?”

“I did. It was really nice. They’re a great couple, Nick and Lauren.”

“Yeah they are,” Caroline said. She paused, staring down at her fingers. She looked up, briefly meeting my eyes before she spoke. “You really signed Kristin’s papers?” she asked, and she turned her eyes away from mine so she was looking into my chest.

“Yes,” I said thickly.

She hesitated a moment then, “Why?”

“Because what she and I shared was over,” I replied.

Caroline looked up, “And I was what was left over?” she asked, “The one you’re gonna choose because you can’t have her?”

“No,” I shook my head. I waved my hand at the graffiti on the wall. “You’re the one that’s always been there, incomplete, in my heart. I’ve always loved you, all along, you’re the one I’ve missed when I didn’t know I was missing. You’re the one that, when she was gone, I found again, the one who’s never given up on me completely, the one who wanted me when I wasn’t anybody worth wanting.” I searched her face with my eyes. I couldn’t tell if she understood, if she believed what I was saying at all. “Caroline, I came here so we could finish what we started decades ago.” I put my hand on the painted heart.

Tears filled her eyes, “You ain’t lyin’?”

I shook my head, “I ain’t lyin’. I love you, Caroline.”

She choked back a sob and took two fast steps into me, pressing against my chest, her arms wrapping around me, clutching my shirt in the back in her fists. “I love you,” she said, her voice muffled by my chest. At least I think that’s what she said, she was crying, her shoulders shaking. I held her close, my arms folded around her.

We stood there what felt like forever, my chin on her hair, the water of the Kentucky River rushing past us. The sun went down, tinged the river and the sky pinkish and then turned it all to gold. “We better get back up to the camp,” I whispered.

She nodded into my chest.

We separated and I grabbed my bag with the paint cans and swung it over my shoulder and we climbed up the steep path that led back up to the cars. My hand wrapped tightly around hers, helping her up the slippery rocks and gravel. At the top, we stood awkwardly between the two cars. I still had her hand in mine. I looked down at it, running my thumb over her knuckles gently, then looked back up at her.

“You really think that we can make it this time?” she asked.

“Yes,” I answered.

“You aren’t gonna run away on me?”

I shook my head.

“And I’m not just… filling some kind of hole in your heart or something?” she asked.

“Of course you’re filling a hole,” I replied. “But it’s a Caroline-shaped hole, so you’re doing damn good at it.”

She smiled slowly, “You’re such a dork.” She swept her hand over the tears in her eyes and turned to her car, “I’ll see you at the camp.”

“Okay,” I replied, and I got in my car, too.




Nick and Lauren were sitting on the steps of the house when we pulled up, illuminated by the warm glow of the porch lamp. Nick stood up the second our headlights cut the dark. As soon as I’d cut the engine he jogged over, bouncing foot to foot. “Well?” he asked as I pushed the door open, “Did it work? Did it work? Are y’all together? Did it work?”

Caroline got out of her car, slamming the door, “Nick Carter,” she said in a twangy voice, “You lyin’ lil shit, you said he wasn’t with you!”

Nick paused in his hopping. “I -- well, he wasn’t, was he? Not technically?”

Caroline shook her head.

Nick looked confused, “Wait. Wait, I don’t get it. Did it work?” he looked at Lauren, then back to me and Caroline, “Kev?”

I snaked my arm around Caroline’s waist. “It worked,” I replied.

“FUCK YES!” Nick yelled, and he ran for Lauren, who stood up as he jumped at her, giving her a huge hug and she caught him, somehow without falling over. “We did it, baby!” he hooted. Lauren laughed as he squeezed her, bouncing excitedly around, carrying her arms with him, flapping them wildly about like he was some kind of crazy bird.

As ridiculous as he looked, it was basically how I felt on the inside. I looked at Caroline with a smile and she smiled back. It was nice, everybody having their somebody, and I wondered at the full circle we all had come in, at how many things might never have happened if it hadn’t have been this way.

Everything happens for a reason, I guess, I thought, and I was thankful for it, even if I hadn’t been able to see it as it unfolded.




Two months later, the Boys and I were on tour and we’d just wrapped up our show in Cincinnati. Brian and I were going to drive south to visit our families, since we had the next day off, and I was just dialing Caroline’s number as I climbed onto my tour bus, wiping my face with a hand towel, when I looked up and found she was sitting there, smiling, waiting for me.

“You came,” I said.

She’d been busy at the camp, prepping for her first session with a group of parents and their kids traveling from West Virginia to see the horses. They were scheduled to arrive the next day, actually, and when I’d invited her to the show in Cincinnati, she’d been nervous about having time to get everything done before they got there in the morning. I’d told her it was okay if she didn’t make it to the show, that I’d drive down myself after.

She laughed, “I did, and I’m so glad I did. That was a great show. You were incredible.” Her eyes sparkled. “I’m so proud of you.” She stood up. “And… also, I have something to show you. I couldn’t wait for you to get to Irvine to show you.”

“Yeah?” I tossed the hand towel into the laundry hamper and walked over, expecting the something to be a hug or a kiss, but instead, she grabbed an envelope off the counter, opened it and pulled out a paper, which she shook to unfold.

“In a fine example of perfect timing, this came in the mail today,” she said, holding it out to me.

I took it, staring down at the page. It was the 501c.3 registered officially to the Down Home Equine Therapy Camp. I looked up at her, “Holy shit! Look at you!” I reached out and wrapped my arms around her, careful not to smoosh the certificate on her back as I hugged her tight. “Now it’s my turn to be proud of you, damn girl, makin’ your dreams come true and all that.”

She grinned and took the page back, staring down at it. “It wouldn’t have been possible if it wasn’t for you, Kev. Thank you.”

“You know what this calls for, this calls for a celebration…” I went over to the mini fridge and rooted around. All I had in there was a half empty container of orange juice. But it would do. I pulled it out and poured two glasses, handing one to her. “To Down Home,” I said.

“Down Home,” she replied, and we clinked our glasses together and drank.

Once we’d finished, I put my glass down on the counter, “You’re going to need updated flyers and brochures,” I said, “Now that you’re a registered 501c.3. Which means you’ll need some new photography done…” I paused and pulled open the window of the bus. Outside, a gaggle of crew members were standing around. “Hey y’all,” I shouted, “Justin down there with you?”

“Yeah?” Justin yelled back.

“You available tomorrow to take some pictures for me?”

“Sure, I guess so. Where at?”




We’d tied balloons to the camp sign to welcome the families. The horses were freshly cleaned and brushed down, the fields newly mowed. Justin was just walking back from taking pictures of the cabins out in the woods, his camera slung around his neck. He looked strangely out of place, his hipster hair and big ol’ camera giving him away as a city boy, even though his flannel shirt might’ve suggested otherwise. Caroline was sitting astride of Barbara, stroking her mane, and I was leaning against the fence, watching as she rode in circles, exercising the horse’s legs. Justin came up and leaned against the fence with me. “This place is rustic,” he said.

I didn’t know if rustic was a compliment or a complaint.

He took a couple steps back and knelt down, taking a picture of Caroline on the horse from between the rungs of the fence.

“Good Lord I’m nervous,” Caroline mumbled as Barbara came to a stop alongside the fence. She slid down from the horse’s back, stroking her front haunch before climbing over the fence.

“You are going to be spectacular,” I replied.

Justin was snapping pictures of Barbara, leaning over the fence to get some close ups of the horse’s face, clicking his tongue to get her to move her head in the direction he needed for the picture. “I would’ve liked this place when I was a kid,” he said.

“Yeah?” Caroline looked over at him.

“Definitely,” he replied.

I guess rustic was good.

Caroline took a deep breath, “It’s just terrifying.”

“I understand,” I replied. “Good things are always terrifying. You’re scared ‘cos you want it so much, that’s all. But once you get started, you’ll see it ain’t as scary as you think and you’ll be okay. You’re reaching a dream.”

She smiled.

“Can I take some shots inside the barn?” Justin asked.

“Sure,” Caroline replied.

We led the way to the barn and Caroline pulled open the doors so Justin could do in. The other two horses were in their stalls and they shuffled and whinnied as Justin snapped pictures of the rafters and the hay, the equipment hanging on the walls and the horses looking at him from their pens.

I turned to Caroline, looking right into her eyes. “I have a question.”

“Yeah?”

“Will you marry me?”

Caroline smiled. “Will you promise not to run away this time?”

“I promise.”

She laughed, “Then I’d say marrying you is long overdue.”

I bent forward, pressing my lips to hers, and she wrapped her arms around my neck. We were just getting to the good part when Justin came out of the barn and I heard the click of the camera. “Good shot,” he commented with a smirk to his voice, “And look, there’s the kids.”

I looked up. A big school bus was rumbling up the driveway, painted bright white with the Autism Speaks blue puzzle piece logo on the side. Inside were a group of people coming to see the horses that Caroline had worked with, coming to Irvine, Kentucky, to find answers and to find hope again. I felt like telling them that was exactly what they’d find here by coming down home.