Free To Say Goodbye by Lindsay Detwiler Page A

to not give up. A determination to live the life she had planned, just in a different way.
    “Thank you. I’m glad you came today.”
    He took this as his cue to leave, standing and clearing the garbage away. “Call me anytime you need me.”
    She walked him to the door, hanging on the oak doorframe as she said to him, “Same to you.”
    She smiled at him, waving him goodbye, and he turned to head toward his truck.
    He had gone to visit her to help her through a rough day.
    What he hadn’t expected was that seeing Sophia would help him as well, help him see the hope he had thought was gone.

CHAPTER EIGHT
    Sophia
    S he lay on her side, his Penn State hoodie in her arms. She’d told herself after the first month was up, she’d stop doing this. But she couldn’t. She pressed the hoodie against her face, breathed in, and smelled the faint smell of Tim. She was probably imagining it, but it comforted her just the same. She fell asleep with the hoodie in her arms every night since he was gone. It was crazy, she knew, but it felt like a piece of him was still here. It felt like she wasn’t in the bed alone.
    Tears streaming down her face as the moonlight scattered the darkness just enough, she caught a glimpse of the empty pillow. She could tell herself the hoodie helped, tell herself she could feel Tim’s presence.
    It was a lie, though.
    Here, in the darkness, his absence was most noticeable. The gaping hole on his side of the bed, the lack of a good-night kiss, the absence of his I love you underscoring the loss. Here, in the bed they shared, she was left with the reality of his departure. She was left to toss and turn, to ponder the life gone by, the life she lost, and the coming years of loneliness.
    How many more years would she go to sleep alone? How many more nights would she lie here, drowning in tears of pity and sorrow? How many more nights would she agonize over the constricting feeling in her chest, the knowledge he would never smile at her, would never tell her about his day, would never whisper to her again?
    It was torturous.
    Rolling on to her other side to turn away from the physical sign of his absence, she thought about tonight. She thought about Jackson showing up.
    It was a simple gesture, maybe even an awkward one. His blatant nervousness told her he’d second-guessed himself for showing up. She’d seen on his face the fear, the worry of what to say.
    But once he’d settled in, they’d relaxed into a comfortable encounter. His presence, his voice, it soothed her. She knew a part of it was she felt a link to Tim when he was close. She felt like someone who also understood Tim on a fundamental level was there, someone she could talk to about his quirks and nuances.
    Thinking about it, though, there was something else. It was in the way he looked at her, the way he seemed to know what she needed to hear before she knew herself. It was in his kind gestures, his calm demeanor. It was in his steel-gray eyes.
    When she looked into his eyes, she saw a familiarity, an understanding. He wasn’t afraid of her despair, of her hopelessness. He embraced it. He understood it. When she looked at him, she recognized another lost soul. And somehow, it made her feel more hopeful. It made her feel like she wasn’t alone.
    She barely knew Jackson. She only knew of his connections to Tim. A piece of her, though, wanted to know more. She wanted to know just Jackson, the man behind the friendship. She wanted to know what caused the ache in his eyes. She wanted to help him sort through the demons he was facing, the demons clearly written into the lines on his rigid face. She wanted to know how he got to who he was today, what he’d faced along the way. She wanted to help him the way he was helping her.
    Her stomach fell, and she turned back over to face Tim’s spot.
    An unfamiliar feeling settled into her, and she set her jaw rigid.
    Guilt.
    She shouldn’t be lying here, thinking about another man. Sure, the