“It was a lot easier when my grandmother ran things. She had my dad do all the manual labor while she took care of everything else—housekeeping, paperwork, taxes, et cetera. When I was younger, I would do little odd jobs here and there to help out, but once I got older, I started taking over a lot of my grandma’s responsibilities. And now, after my dad’s heart attack, I’ve had to do even more. But for the most part, we have our own duties, and it works out well for us.”
“Your grandmother works here, too?”
His hooded eyes held me captive, and the way he looked at me made me wonder if he could read my thoughts. There was a glint in them that I couldn’t ignore, convincing me that he understood me on a level no one else ever had. “Not anymore…she died three years ago, two months before my dad’s heart attack.”
I wanted to say something, but the only words I could think of were I’m sorry, and I believed in reserving that for recent losses. Offering someone—especially someone you barely knew—condolences for something that happened years ago felt more like a cowardly copout than genuine compassion to me. However, it didn’t make the desire to offer him my sympathies go away. Instead, I took a swig of my wine cooler and asked, “I take it this resort is family-owned?”
“Yeah, my grandma opened it right after the reservoir was created. It began as just a simple bed and breakfast on the side of the mountain, which is now the main house on the property. That’s where we keep the artifacts and history of Chogan. My grandma actually lived upstairs until the day she died, and it’s also where my dad grew up. He didn’t move out until he and my mom built their own place.”
“Your mom runs the resort, too?”
He stared off across the room and hesitated for a moment before answering, making me regret my question. “No. She left a long time ago. She didn’t want to live her life day in and day out at the resort, so she left. I was six. I don’t remember too much of it other than their fights when she’d come to see me…then she started canceling trips. And by the time I turned thirteen, she just stopped visiting altogether.”
I covered his hand with mine on the cushion between us in an involuntary attempt to comfort him. But to my surprise, he found my stare and offered me comfort of his own in the form of a brilliant grin that turned his hooded eyes into two perfect crescents. They were like two oysters with obsidian stones glistening through the shadows and holding me hostage.
“It’s okay. I’m beyond over it.”
I wondered if that was the equivalent of a woman saying she was fine. “When was the last time you saw her?”
“Three years ago, when she came to my high school graduation.”
“Have you at least talked since then?” I couldn’t imagine going longer than a few days without hearing from my mom, so the thought of going years was a concept I couldn’t grasp. It shocked me so much that my voice lifted a few octaves—which made him smile even more, so I couldn’t complain.
Rather than move his hand away from mine, he gently caressed my nailbeds with the pad of his thumb. And instead of turning away, he kept his attention glued to my face. “I don’t really see a point in reaching out to her, and she hasn’t made any effort to contact me either. There was a brief moment when my dad was in the hospital after his heart attack that I thought about calling her, but I knew what she would say, so I decided against it.”
“What do you think she would’ve said?”
“Same thing she said the last time we spoke…that I’m wasting my life here.” He released a heavy huff and leaned further into the cushion, dropping his head to the back of the couch. “I understand what she was saying—being trapped in these woods limits all aspects of life. But I disagree with the notion that higher education is the be-all and end-all. I’m getting real-life managerial skills here. Just because something is limited doesn’t make it wasted.”
“That’s what your mom told you when she came to your graduation?”
“Yup,” he whispered with a solemn nod, now staring at our hands between us. While he mindlessly traced my fingers with his, his thoughts seemed to be somewhere else. “It was such an absurd idea that I couldn’t even give it any thought. Leave my family? At eighteen, when my grandmother was ill? No way.”
I seriously wondered just how beyond over it he was.
It seemed pretty evident that it was, in fact, the equivalent of fine.
“My dad has always been my hero, and my grandmother had been—and always will be—my angel. In life and in death. I would’ve never been able to look at myself in the mirror had I left them behind. Especially considering that my grandma died a couple of months later…then my dad collapsed and had to be rushed to the hospital. Imagine what would’ve happened if I hadn’t been here.” His pain toed the line of anger.
Needing to turn this back around—this was not how I’d pictured this going—I squeezed his hand, earning his full attention. “It’s clear that this place holds a lot of meaning for your family…I want to hear about it. Tell me the importance of Black Bird Resort.”
My heart melted with the easiness that spread across his face.
“My grandmother used to live in Chogan—which, as you probably know by now, is the town that rests beneath the reservoir. She moved away after high school, which was about a year before the flood, so her entire childhood was built there. That’s where she fell in love for the first time—from what she said,” he added with a smirk. “Shortly after they flooded the valley, she built her house on the side of the mountain, basically to watch over the lost town.”
“That’s it? You guys have poured your blood, sweat, and tears into this place for three generations, all because your grandmother wanted a reminder of where she grew up?” There had to be more to it; no one would sacrifice that much for something that should’ve been a vacation home.
Drew removed his hand from mine to run it down his face, showing his fatigue. As he spoke, he stared at the ceiling, refusing to meet my gaze, which was odd because he didn’t sound sad or upset as he explained it to me. “She wanted to make sure no one forgot about Chogan. She wanted to make sure that people remained educated about the town and give the former residents a place to come and stay—since their houses had been buried.”
“Do you get a lot of Chogan residents staying here? Or people coming to learn about the town and the reservoir?”
“No,” he muttered with a flippant eye roll. “To be honest, I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone from there. If I had to guess, I’d say they are either dead, don’t have a clue this place even exists, or they simply don’t give a shit about it.”
Unfortunately, that didn’t clear up my confusion. “Why keep it open?”
He shrugged and returned his attention to me, making me wonder if he’d glanced away out of embarrassment over his family’s motivations. “If you ask me, it’s pointless. But my dad, following in his mother’s footsteps, has continued her mission. I get it…he grew up listening to her stories and reasons for keeping this place going. Hell, I’ve heard it all, too. I don’t blame him for wanting to carry it on, but I just don’t see the point. I personally believe that it’s time to let it go.”