The Best of Me - Nicholas Sparks [83]
She finally turned and followed her daughter to the porch. By then Amanda was already seated in one of the rocking chairs. Dawson put the car back into gear and slowly drove it toward the garage.
He climbed out and leaned against the workbench. From where he was standing, he could no longer see Amanda, nor could he imagine what she would say to her mother. As he looked around Tuck’s garage, something pricked Dawson’s memory, something that Morgan Tanner had said while he and Amanda had been in his office. He’d said that both Dawson and Amanda would know when to read the letter he’d written each of them, and all at once he knew that Tuck had meant for him to read it now. Tuck probably foresaw how things would play out.
Reaching into his back pocket, he pulled out the envelope. Unfolding it, he ran his finger over his name. It was the same shaky scrawl he’d noticed in the letter he and Amanda had read together. Turning the envelope over, he pried it open. Unlike the previous letter, this one was only a single page, front and back. In the quiet of the garage that Dawson once called home, he focused on the words and began to read.
Dawson,
I’m not exactly sure how to start this letter, other than to tell you that over the years, I’ve come to know Amanda pretty well. I’d like to think she hasn’t changed since I first laid eyes on her, but I can’t honestly say for sure. Back then, you two kept pretty much to yourselves, and like a lot of young folk you both went still whenever I came around. Had no problem with that, by the way. Did the same thing with Clara. Don’t know if her daddy heard me talk until after we were married, but that’s another story.
My point is, I don’t really know who she was, but I know who she is now, and let’s just say I know why you never got over her. She’s got a lot of goodness inside her, that one. Lots of love, lots of patience, smart as a whip, and she’s just about the prettiest thing that ever walked the streets of this town, that’s for sure. But it’s her kindness I think I like best because I’ve been around long enough to know how rare something like that really is.
I’m probably not telling you anything you don’t already know, but over the last few years, I’ve come think of her as something like a daughter. That means I have to talk to you like maybe her daddy would have, because daddies ain’t worth much if they don’t worry just a little. Especially about her. Because more than anything else, you should understand that Amanda’s hurting, and I think she’s been hurting for a while now. I saw it when she first came to see me, and I guess I hoped it was a phase, but the more she came to visit, the worse she seemed to be feeling. Every now and then, I’d wake up and see her poking around the garage, and I began to understand that you were part of the reason she was feeling the way she was. She was haunted by the past, haunted by you. But trust me when I say that memories are funny things. Sometimes they’re real, but other times they change into what we want them to be, and in her own way, I think Amanda was trying to figure out what the past really meant to her. That’s the reason I set up the weekend like I did. I had a hunch that seeing you again was the only way she was going to find her way out of the darkness, whatever that might mean.
But like I said, she’s hurting, and if there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that people in pain don’t always see things as clearly as they should. She’s at the point in her life where she has to make some decisions, and that’s where you come in. Both of you need to figure out what happens next, but keep in mind that she might need more time than you do. She might even change