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And Benny had responded to it. It was amazing. She really needed to stop thinking about how Brody was different.
She needed to focus on all the ways that he was just like his brother. Far too handsome for his own good...
Well, her brain stalled out there. Because she thought of the kiss again. He wasn’t just handsome. It was more than that.
He wasn’t a sexy superhero, untouchable because he was fictional, and on a movie screen. He had been there. He had been very, very touchable, and she—in fact—had touched him.
It was difficult to believe. Sometimes, she could convince herself that it was actually just a product of her fevered imagination. The same one that had cooked up that fantasy dream that had made her actually...
She started singing. Off-key, while she drove herself and Benny over to the town hall. Because she needed to get her thoughts redirected, so even though she had a terrible voice, she thought maybe warbling about being a firework lighting the sky up would make her feel better.
“Mom,” Benny said, covering his ears.
“I’m making a joyful noise,” she said.
“It’s bad,” Benny said, but he laughed.
“I have my talents. Music might not be one of them, but I like it a lot.”
“Keep practicing I guess,” Benny said.
And she loved that he was still the age where he believed that “practice might make perfect” with anything. She was pretty certain that practice wasn’t going to fix tone deaf, at least not without professional intervention, but she liked that he could still believe in that.
That he still believed in things.
He was good for her heart.
They drove all the way to a part of Four Corners she hadn’t been to yet. Sullivan’s Point. The little farmhouse off in the distance was beautiful, picturesque, and the barn, where all of the trucks were parked, was old, but warm and inviting. There was a big bonfire already, as promised, table set outside, laden with food, and gas heaters all around them, providing heat.
It was cold outside, and the snow from yesterday still hadn’t melted in patches. But it looked like they did a great job of making the outdoors cozy here.
There was a whole passel of kids running around in the front and playing.
“You know them?”
“Yeah. It’s all my friends from school.”
“Well... You can play with them,” she said.
And she felt like she had just physically taken a baby bird and flung it up toward the sky. And as she parked the car, and Benny unbuckled, tumbled out, and ran off, she knew a severe sense of loss.
Wow. You are overdramatic.
She was. But then, he was everything to her. He was the thing that had given her purpose when she had felt like there wasn’t any. And as embarrassing as it was for her to admit now, she really had gone through a time when she hadn’t felt like her life had much purpose. It was the heartbreak. And not just that, the way the rug felt pulled out from under her. Just when she had finally been beginning to trust in some good in the universe.
She’d been so happy. A young mother with a baby, handsome husband, a beautiful house...
She found herself distracted by Brody standing in the doorway of the barn. Like he had known that she’d arrived. How would he know that? There were people pulling in behind her, people walking around all over the place. Her arrival shouldn’t be any more significant than that.
Except, he began to walk toward her. She knew that he was walking toward her. She knew that he saw her.
That realization felt more significant somehow.
He saw her.
It felt like more than she’d bargained for.
She got out of the car, and he closed the distance between them, his fingertips brushing the edge of his cowboy hat. “Howdy.”
