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Contents ( 42)
  1. The Art of Breathing
  2. Part One: How We Became Who We Are
  3. Prologue: Or, Where the Kid Hears the Word of the Day
  4. 1. Where Tyson Learns to Breathe
  5. 2. Where Tyson Makes a Phone Call
  6. 3. Where Tyson Graduates and Bear Freaks Out
  7. 4. Where Tyson Says Good-Bye
  8. 5. Where Tyson Gets the Mail
  9. Part Two: Coming Home
  10. 6. Where Tyson Comes Home
  11. 7. Where Tyson Gives a History Lesson
  12. 8. Where Tyson Attends the Most Awkward Party Ever
  13. 9. Where Tyson Plans Attends a Protest
  14. 10. Where Tyson Gets Arrested
  15. 11. Where Tyson Gets His Ass Handed to Him
  16. 12. Where Tyson Writes Bad Poetry and Gawks at Frat Boys
  17. 13. Where Tyson Decides to Man the Fuck Up
  18. 14. Where Tyson Asks Some Questions
  19. 15. Where Tyson Remembers Theresa Jean Paquinn
  20. 16. Where Tyson Learns the Benefit of Therapy
  21. 17. Where Tyson Meets the Man Who Becomes Helena Handbasket
  22. 18. Where Tyson Gets Screwed at His Own Birthday Party (And Not in a Good Way)
  23. Part Three: Just Breathe
  24. 19. Where Tyson Goes to Helena Handbasket’s Sex Dungeon
  25. 20. Where Tyson Beholds the Awesome Wonder That Is Paul Auster
  26. 21. Where Tyson Receives Advice from the Six Sages
  27. 22. Where Tyson Makes a Phone Call
  28. 23. Where Tyson Hears the Inevitable
  29. 24. Where Tyson Meets His Match
  30. 25. Where Tyson Says Hello, Where Tyson Says Good-bye
  31. 26. Where Tyson Touches upon the Inevitable
  32. 27. Where Tyson Faces the Music
  33. 28. Where Tyson Breathes
  34. 29. Tyson And Dominic
  35. 30. The Art Of Breathing
  36. Epilogue: Or, Bear’s Perspective, As It Were (Yeah, He’s Gonna Freak)
  37. Author’s Note
  38. Excerpt
  39. Prologue: Or, Where Bear Answers the Door
  40. More from TJ Klune
  41. Readers love the Bear, Otter, and the Kid Chronicles by TJ Klune
  42. By TJ Klune

“When people tell me that, it usually means I’m not going to like it,” I say glumly.

Stacey laughs. “Probably. But you need to hear it.”

“Okay.”

She takes a deep breath and then lets it out slowly. She looks out the window into the afternoon, then back at me. It’s only a second she looks away, but in that second her face hardens, and her eyes turn steely. “You broke him,” she says. Gone is the laughter in her voice. “When you left. When you abandoned him. When you took yourself away from him, when you cast him off like he was nothing so you could lick your wounds, you broke him.”

“I—”

“No interrupting, remember?”

I nod and sit back, helpless.

She watches me for a moment to make sure I’m sincere before she continues. “I sent your invitation out early. We hadn’t even agreed on a design yet. He told me he’d already told you. That you were happy. That you were okay. I should have looked closer, but everything was swirling around me then. The pregnancy, him. His mood since you’d gone away to school. It was all too much. And then the day came when you stopped it all.

“He tried to hide it. He tried to go on like nothing had changed. Like he wasn’t unhappy. Like he wasn’t upset. Like he just hadn’t had his whole world turned upside down. Because whether you realize it or not, Tyson, that’s what you were. You were his world. The rest of us just drifted right on by. When you pulled away, so did he. He acted like it was nothing, but I knew him. It wasn’t nothing.”

She looks down at her hands. “We were never meant to be, he and I. I know that. I’ve had a long time to accept it, and I have. I’ve moved on. I have a wonderful life. I can stand on my own two feet. I have a man who loves me. I have a son I would do anything for. But even though Dom and I didn’t work out, that doesn’t mean I don’t still love him. Do you understand?”

I nod. Then, quietly, “He loves you too.”

“I know. We’re friends. But even if we weren’t, we’re always going to be bound together because of Ben. Ben has to come first. No matter what. You were Dom’s world before, Tyson, but now you’re going to have to share it. Nothing, and I mean nothing, can bring harm to Ben. Are we clear?”

I nod.

She looks a little sad. “He told me, one day. I don’t know why he came clean or what he thought would happen. He told me how he felt. You know. About you. But I had already figured it out long ago.”

“How?”

“The looks he gave you,” she says. “Like you were the only magic he’d ever known. I knew that look for what it was. And when you left, it was like a light had gone out in him.”