Chapter 8 #3
“Most people are small compared to you,” I pointed out. “I certainly am and it never bothered me that he’s, um, diminutive. I met him when I had just started college, when I was sixteen.”
“College at sixteen? That can’t be right.”
“I got ahead in school,” I explained. “I graduated pretty early. I didn’t start dating Dax until later, though, because he’s a little older.”
“How much older?”
“He’s thirty-eight now,” I said, and Silas could do math.
“So you met him when you were sixteen and he was twenty-seven. Eleven years older, the fucking pervert. What would you think if that was Lyra?” I could tell what he would think, because he was crushing a pillow in his hands as if he was murdering someone.
“You’re that age now. Can you imagine what you’d have in common with a kid who just got his license? ”
“We didn’t get together until I was eighteen,” I corrected. “But I was in love with him the whole time. He was very different from anyone I had known before and I thought he was exciting. He’s not a totally bad person, but I can see now why people hated him.”
“Can you? Do you see the problems?” Silas started counting them out on his fingers.
“He broke into your apartment and scared the crap out of you, he tried to humiliate you with a rap, he gave you fake diamonds to make himself look good. He cheated on you and lied more than you’ll probably ever know.
” He studied me in the dim glow that came only from the porch light. “But you don’t hate him.”
“I don’t love him anymore, though. I did for a while even after we broke up, but I can promise now that I don’t.”
“If he came knocking at that door, would you take him back?”
My eyes immediately went to the entrance, and Silas shook his head as if I’d answered his question. “No!” I countered. “I really wouldn’t. Enough time has passed and my feelings really have changed. But it’s still hard to think that…never mind.”
“What?”
It was hard to think that I wasn’t good enough for Dax, when I’d tried so hard to be what he wanted.
I never would have been, though. No matter how much I worked on it, I couldn’t have transformed myself into a sexy, exciting woman who drew eyes at the club (for good things and not because she was a terrible dancer).
And the longer that we’d been apart, the less I was sure that I wanted to be that woman, anyway.
I didn’t say that to Silas, who didn’t seem to have a shortage of self-confidence and wouldn’t have understood about the need to have someone love you. “Have you ever had a serious relationship?” I asked. “Like, were you were ever thinking of marriage?”
He actually laughed. “No,” he finally managed to say. “No, I never would have married any of the women I was with and I never lived with anyone. No kids, either, thank fu—” He glanced toward my parents’ bedroom. “Thank goodness.”
That was what I had figured about him: he just wasn’t a settle-down kind of guy. “You only have Lyra.”
“She’s my sister,” he reminded me. “I’m glad every day that I don’t have kids of my own.”
“You’re a good parent to her, though.”
“Yeah? Is that why I got another email from the school today while we were on the road?”
“Oh, no!” I groaned. “What now?”
He hadn’t wanted to read any further as soon as he’d seen the “from” field with the teacher’s name, but I said that he had to. So he took out the nice phone that he hadn’t admitted to owning and started to look for the message.
“Why did you hide this from me?” I asked, tapping its cover gently.
“My phone? Did I? Shit, here’s the email.” He squinted. “What could it be? She’s doing better, right?”
“Open it.” I sat up and leaned over, so that I could also see.
And both of us were stunned. “Really?” Silas asked.
“It actually makes a lot of sense,” I said. “We know how smart she is.”
“’Accelerated,’” he read from the screen. “Does that mean gifted?”
“They’re recognizing that she needs more than what she’s getting in her classroom right now, but I don’t know how they’ll handle it. The teacher wants you to come in for a meeting and she’ll probably explain everything.”
“Yeah.” He looked up at me. “Will you come?”
“I’m not her real guardian,” I pointed out. “They might not want me there.”
“I want you, though. You’ll ask the right questions and they’ll pay attention when you talk.”
“People pay attention when you talk, too,” I said, but he shook his head.
“Because they’re intimidated. They listen to you because you’re gifted, too. You must scare the shit out of the people you work with.”
“I don’t,” I protested. “You saw them at Rashelle’s wedding, and they weren’t scared of me.”
“I used the wrong words. I mean that they’re scared of messing up because they want to do their best for you. You’re good at your job and they know that you’re worth listening to. You’re their boss for a reason.”
“Thank you, Silas.”
“You’re welcome.” He thumped the cushion beneath him. “This couch isn’t much better than the one at my house. You think you can sleep here?”
“Maybe. And I’ll definitely go to the meeting at Lyra’s school if you want me to.”
“Thanks, Camille,” he said, and stood up. “My sister sleeps like a starfish.”
“Good luck,” I told him, and he sighed as he walked back to my old bedroom.
The next morning, both he and I were a little cranky, but Lyra was raring to go.
She had remembered what I’d told her about the animals here, so my dad took her on a tour while my mom made breakfast. Both she and Silas tried grits for the first time and were not huge fans, but they loved her biscuits, and eggs were always well-received.
We shooed my mom out of the kitchen to clean up and then did the softball demo, and the day went by easily. I was so happy to be home.
“Cammie, let me get your hair out of the way,” my mom said at one point, which was what she always said when she thought the dark waves were getting unruly. I dutifully sat in front of her chair on the porch while she braided it for me, and then she looked over at Lyra.
“Could I do yours?” she asked. Lyra jumped up to take my spot and I joined my dad on the porch swing.
Silas sat on a step, because I’d seen him testing out the furniture and then maybe deciding that it wasn’t going to hold him.
“Camille can help you with your hair for school,” my mom mentioned as she carefully brushed, and Lyra’s lip poked out. “I know that she’d be happy to.”
I stopped myself from chiming in that I would, and then repeating it a few times for emphasis. I only nodded sedately and put a “slightly interested and not overeager” expression on my face.
“She’s busy,” Lyra announced, but Silas shook his head.
“That’s not true. She’s never too busy to help you,” he told her. “Who stayed up late on Wednesday to make cupcakes for your class?”
“I bet I know the recipe she used,” my mom said. “We made those together and it was so fun.”
“It’s more fun to bake with someone,” I agreed. “I love making things with Lyra.”
She had been frowning but I watched her sneak a glance at me. “You do?”
I nodded, trying again not to be overly enthusiastic. “I really do.”
“Lyra, how long has it been since you got a haircut?” my mother asked her.
“Never,” she said firmly.
“It seems like now is a good time, doesn’t it? Cammie, get my kit, please.” My mom turned to Silas and smiled. “Then it will be your turn.”
His hand went to his ponytail, but then he looked at his sister. “That’s a great idea,” he managed to choke out.
“It is?” Lyra asked, and her brother forced his head to bob up and down.
“Let’s do it,” he answered, and I fetched the scissors.