We have to wait a few days after the engagement until it’s John’s weekend with his daughter before we can all get together and...celebrate.
John made sure to pick a place that had plenty of clearance under the tables because he’s never forgotten the restaurant with the pedestals so thick that I couldn’t get within a foot of the table.
He’s a kind man, sweet to my mom and me both. I should be grinning right alongside Layla as they talk about plans for the wedding and all the ways we’re going to blend our two families together.
“It’s all happening so fast,” I say when my mom mentions the date for the wedding that’s barely a month away.
“Well, we’ve both done this before.” John gives my mom a sheepish grin. “And I don’t want to wait any longer than I have to before I can start calling your mom my wife. We can get rings, a dress, and a license in that time. Why draw it out?”
I glance over at my mom to make sure she’s on board with the timetable John’s proposing and she seems fine, nodding along with him.
“Oh, we could do our own version of House Hunters,” John says. “Narrow down our top three picks with pros and cons. My must-haves are that it be close to Layla’s mom’s and not too far from my work. What about you, Bug?”
Layla pauses in the act of carefully coloring a picture on her kid’s menu to answer him. “Me and Bec want a pool, right?” She beams up at me, her big brown eyes made adorably owlish behind her glasses.
That suffocating feeling I’ve had since the engagement eases a bit. Layla isn’t big on getting wet. Sometimes I can coax her into swimming with me, but for almost everyone else she’ll smile and say no thank you. She knows I get to be free in the water in a way I can’t be anywhere else and that’s reason enough for her to want a pool too.
I pull her into a tight hug just as my mom says, “We don’t need a new house or a big wedding. We can have a small backyard ceremony before Rebecca leaves for college and then Layla can have her room.”
Layla frowns at my mom for just a second when my arms go stiff around her, but then her face lights up. “Then we can get bunk beds! For when Bec is here. And I’ll sleep on the top because she’s in a wheelchair and it’ll be like having a sleepover all the time. Oh, and we can put star stickers on the ceiling like the constellations.” She gets a faraway look on her face as though she’s imagining it all. “We’ll put star stickers on the underside of my bed for you too,” she assures me.
Oh no, we will not. I’d once put stickers on my mom’s antique china cabinet and can still remember the absolute horror on her face when she saw them. I’d had to spend hours with oil-soaked cotton pads picking each one off with my fingernails.
But then Layla turns to my mom. “We can get the kind we saw at Michaels that peel off without damaging any surfaces.” She says that last part very carefully like she’s reciting someone else’s words. It only takes me a moment to realize they are my mother’s.
“That’s a very smart idea.” My mom smiles at Layla. “But Rebecca is going to be very busy. She probably won’t be able to visit much. What other ideas do you have?”
Layla launches into a million thoughts she has for my room after that and her excitement distracts John from my utter and complete silence through the rest of the meal and the drive home.
“Dinner was nice,” Mom says now as she puts our leftover boxes in the fridge. She pauses when she notices the extra weight in mine. “You didn’t eat much. Are you not feeling well? Because I can call Dr.—”
“Just a big lunch,” I say, watching her move around the kitchen. Look at me, is what I don’t say but scream inside my head. Look at me and see, please. “Mom—”
“Oh, I forgot to mention that John’s sister wants to plan an engagement party in a couple of weeks. We’re thinking the twenty-third. I’ll put it on the calendar so don’t make plans, okay?” Her eyes glide right over me when she turns to leave, a quick smile on her face. “Night.”
There’s a breeze of woodsy perfume as she passes me and a minute later the sound of her shower.
My shoulders hunch in, but I don’t make a noise until I’m out the back door, halfway down the path connecting my yard to the Kellys’. I clamp both hands over my mouth to trap the scream that erupts from inside me. I only stop when someone clears their throat from the shadows to my right.
“It’s just me.” Ethan straightens from beside a bush and pushes his hair back to reveal his face.
“What are you doing?” My voice is only a little raspy, but it’s enough to send heat to my cheeks, not just because he’s witnessed my private scream fest, but because we haven’t seen each other in days.
Ethan shuffles forward a step until he’s fully in the moonlight. “Old Man’s been savaging a gecko out here—well, trying—and I finally had to break them apart.” He nods his chin and I turn to find the cat throwing death glares at Ethan. “Hey, man, if you couldn’t kill him in ten minutes,” he says, raising and directing his voice to the deeply resentful Old Man, “then, you can’t really blame me that he got away, can you?”
I study the cat for a lot longer than necessary. He’s a nice distraction while I try to figure out what note I’m supposed to strike here: super casual ignoring the last time we talked, or awkward and uncomfortable because I have no idea where we stand. I settle on a casual response said in an uncomfortable tone. “He looks like he’s going to pee on your bed later.”
Ethan nods. “Oh, he’s for sure going to piss everywhere.” His voice rises again. “And then he’s gonna be sleeping outside for the week. That’s right. And then you can forget about getting any of those little freeze-dried liver treats either. Yeah, think about that,” he adds when the cat stalks off.
Ethan turns his attention to me then and I hold my breath when he walks closer. I haven’t changed my mind about what I said to him by the pool; he wants too much, but what if, to him, I can’t offer enough?
Will he give me an actual goodbye like he promised but take off all the same?
“So what’s your excuse?”
I glance up at him. “For being outside or for screaming?”
“Screaming?” He raises his eyebrows. “I thought you were singing. And don’t take this the wrong way, but I think you should stick to making jewelry.”
My next breath turns shaky because if my mom has her way, I’ll soon be hundreds of miles away from the shop I love.
Ethen is suddenly right beside me. “I just said the wrong thing, didn’t I?” He swears softly under his breath, then half squats beside me. “I know we haven’t talked in a few days and for all I know you might still be mad at me—”
“I wasn’t really mad at you.”
He rocks his head from side to side and makes kind of an eeeeee sound in the back of his throat. “Agree to disagree. But you were always good at knowing when I needed a hug and I feel like you need one right now. So...here’s your chance to move away if you don’t.”
Maybe I was mad, but right now all I feel is sad. So I don’t move back when he leans in, wrapping me in his arms.
“It was so much easier when we were kids, wasn’t it? Running away from our problems and hiding in my tree house?” From over Ethan’s shoulder, I look up. “It felt like nothing bad could ever happen when it was just the two of us up there.”
My hold loosens on Ethan and he eases back, one hand coming up to push a curl of my hair back from my face. It’s so sweet it makes my chest hurt. “You know that’s not true.”
My gaze stays locked on the tree house. “But it felt like that.” And it’s still there, right there and yet it might as well be a million miles away from me. “There are a lot of things I miss about my life before, but that one—” my gaze roves over every board “—that’s one I still dream about.”
Ethen pivots on his heel, following my gaze, then returns it to me. “Why just dream?”
I actually don’t understand until he starts assessing me.
“What?”
“I could toss you over my shoulder, you know, carry you up fireman style. Probably not the most comfortable for you though.” Still studying me, he rakes a hand through his hair. “We could piggyback it, but with just your arms around my neck. You might end up strangling me, but—” he cocks his head from side to side “—it could work.”
“Ethan, there’s no way.”
“I just gave you two ways. Oh, oh!” A grin lights up his face in the moonlight. “I could just carry you, like regular, except with one arm under your knees and the other on the plank ladder. You’d have to hold on too, but that should work.”
I’m about to object again, but I think he might be right. Again. I think we could do it just like he says. That I could go up to my tree house for the first time since my accident. And I want that, I want it enough to say, “Okay.”
“Yeah?” Ethan’s smile grows. “Okay then. Where do you—”
But I’m already moving closer to the tree, bumping down off the path and onto the grass until my chair is right up against the trunk. Then I lock my wheels.
Ethan looks a little nervous when he approaches me. “If you’re uncomfortable at any moment, promise you’ll say something.”
“And if you feel like you’re going to drop me at any moment, promise you’ll say something.”
That was apparently the key to releasing Ethan’s nerves because he laughs. And then he’s bending over me, sliding an arm around my back and under my knees, lifting me as easily as breathing. “I will never let you go.”
Yeah, I think, that’s exactly why I shouldn’t let you hold on to begin with.
“Ready?”
I nod, securing my arms around his neck and bringing our faces closer than...closer than they’ve been since we almost kissed.
“Up we go.”