Kaegan nodded. “Yes, it was mainly on my part.”

Chester didn’t say anything for a long while, and then he said, “I can only assume you’re taking the necessary steps to win her back...or at least you’re trying.”

“Yes, I’m trying. But at the moment, she doesn’t even want us to be friends.”

Chester nodded as he stared into Kaegan’s eyes. “Don’t give up trying. Hopefully, she’ll eventually come around. I never told you but I messed up with Debbie some years ago.”

Kaegan quirked an eyebrow. “You did?”

“Yes. Before we married. I had made plans to break up...at her parents’ suggestion. They claimed she would never embrace the idea of leaving Canada to live in the United States. I believed them. I’d begun missing my family and no longer had negative thoughts about going to war. I was ready to fight for my country if needed. Only thing, Debbie was pregnant and I didn’t know it. She didn’t intend to tell me, either, because she knew if she had, I would have married her. Since I hadn’t asked her to marry me before then, she felt I would have married her because of the baby and not because I loved her.”

Kaegan nodded. “How did you find out she was pregnant?”

“I overheard a conversation between her and her best friend. I got mad because she hadn’t planned to tell me. That she would let me leave and not know she carried my child. I thought what she planned to do was unforgivable. Then there was another major issue. She was a Canadian girl who I thought would never move away with me to the States. That was a lie her parents told. But still, trying to get her to believe that I loved her was nearly impossible.”

“How did you get her to change her mind about marrying you?”

The older man smiled. “It took a while. But I convinced her I couldn’t live without her, and if she wouldn’t go with me, then I would continue to make Canada my home. That’s when I found out it never had been about her leaving Canada. But still, since I do know how much she loves her homeland, I promised to take her back to Canada to visit her family as often as reasonably possible. It made her parents happy. Made them tolerable.”

The man paused and then said, “Bryce thinks she has every reason not to trust you and be your friend again. You need to make her understand one thing.”

“What?”

“The two of you being friends isn’t an option. You got a nick on your finger to prove it.”

At Kaegan’s surprised expression, Chester said, “Yes, I know about that, too, since it was my knife that was used. I missed it and then one day it miraculously returned to my toolbox. And then there was the fact that you, Vashti and Bryce were all walking around with a bandage on the same finger.”

The older man shook his head, grinning. “When it came to doing things behind my and Debbie’s backs, you and Bryce failed each and every time.”