"No... No...""That money wasn't just what you owed me." I spoke slowly, every word landing hard. "You can pay back money. You can settle every debt on paper. But can you pay back a life?"I pointed at the headstone."You never owed me. You owed her."Tyler clutched his chest like it finally hit him.A broken cry ripped out of him. He collapsed into the mud and started slapping himself in front of Mom's headstone, sobbing so hard he could barely breathe."I'm sorry... I'm sorry... I was wrong. I was so wrong..."I didn't look at him again.I turned toward the cemetery gate."Lindsay! Don't go! Don't leave me here alone!"His desperate cries echoed through the empty cemetery, then disappeared into the mountain wind.I never looked back.My steps stayed steady.At the cemetery gate, I stopped and pulled a rusty key from my pocket.The spare to my old apartment back home.I'd kept it even after selling the place—the last real piece of the eight years Tyler and I had wasted.
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