Chapter 25 #2
Nicole laughed too, quick and quiet, then squeezed my hand before Mama called for somebody to come taste the pasta like she hadn’t made it the same way for thirty years.
After that, the holiday found its rhythm with Micah fast. He carried things without waiting to be asked twice, laughed with my cousins, stood near the grill with my father long enough to be useful without acting like he knew more than the man holding the tongs, and told my aunt Denise, with a straight face, that yes, he had absolutely come prepared to defend his macaroni if necessary.
That got him adopted almost immediately.
I watched him from the kitchen doorway once while he stood outside with my father, one hand in his pocket, the other wrapped around a bottle of Coors, head bent like whatever my father was saying actually mattered.
He kept finding me too, through the yard, across the kitchen, with those little looks that told me he always knew where I was even when half my family stood between us.
At one point, he came in behind me while I was refilling the sweet tea and put one warm hand low at my back as he passed. Nothing loud. Still enough to make my whole body notice.
My mother saw it, of course she did.
When he moved on, she looked at me over the rim of a serving spoon and smiled in a way that made me feel briefly seventeen and fully exposed.
“Don’t start,” I said quietly.
“I didn’t say a word.”
“Your face did.”
She just turned back to the stove.
By late afternoon, the yard had gone lazy with food and heat and full bellies.
Somebody had put Frankie Beverly and Maze on.
Kids ran through the grass with popsicles.
My father had loosened enough to start exaggerating old stories.
My aunt Denise had switched from correcting plates to correcting people’s life choices more generally.
And everywhere I turned, somebody had something to say about me.
“Baby, you glowing.”
“Talia, look at your skin.”
“Oh, she happy-happy.”
I threatened each one of them with violence, which only made the laughter louder.
Micah was beside me under the shade umbrella near the deck steps when my mother called from the kitchen that they were out of ice. My father tossed money in our direction before I could even think of volunteering anybody else.
Micah caught it one-handed.
“I got it.”
I reached for my bag. “I’m coming.”
The look my mother gave me should have embarrassed me more than it did.
It didn’t.
In the car, the air conditioner came on hard enough to make me sigh. Micah backed out easy, one hand on the wheel, the other resting near the console, and looked over at me once.
“You all right?”
“Yeah.”
Then I laughed softly. “You’re doing good.”
“With your people?”
“With my people.”
He smiled a little. “That sounds like a progress report.”
“It is.”
“And?”
“And my aunt Denise already likes you, which is concerning. She normally takes longer to be charmed.”
“That right?”
“Yes. You should worry.”
He laughed, and I liked that too much.
We got the ice and came back with the kind of ease that only meant more because it had been hard-won. Every little thing between us felt placed now. Nothing vague. Nothing blurred around the edges. Even the quiet sat differently.
That was the gift.
The evening softened after that. We ate.
We laughed. Micah ended up in a heated dominoes game with my father and Uncle Raymond that taught me more about his competitive side than I absolutely needed to know in one sitting.
The children liked him, which mattered more than adult approval half the time. He stayed useful, warm, fully himself.
And I stayed easier.
That was the real proof.
Later, when the sky had started to go gold and the first round of leftovers was being packed away, I found him off by the grill with my father. They stood a little apart from everybody else, talking low, smoke and late light catching at the edges of them.
I watched them longer than I meant to.
My father nodded once. Micah laughed softly at something he said.
Then my father clapped his shoulder, and that alone did something to me I had no business letting it do in broad daylight.
I wondered what they were talking about. I wondered if my name was in it.
If my future was in it.
If my father, in his quiet way, was handing a man instructions he would never say aloud in front of me.
By the time the day finally started winding down and people were gathering foil pans, folding chairs, half-finished conversations, and children sticky with juice into their cars, I still hadn’t asked.
Not until we were alone for half a minute near the back steps, the deck still carrying my family in full volume behind us.
Micah stood close enough that his shoulder brushed mine and stayed there.
I looked up at him.
“What were you and my dad talking about?”
“That’s private.”
I frowned.
He laughed under his breath and touched the back of my neck, his thumb low under my ear.
“Stop worrying that mind of yours.”
“That only brought on more worry, Micah.”
He looked at me for a second, quiet and warm and full of something I no longer doubted.
Then he leaned down and kissed my forehead.
“I love you,” he said. “And I’ll keep showing you.”
That settled in me deeper than any actual answer might have.
I searched his face anyway, because I was me and because I wanted more.
He just smiled.
“Also,” he added, “my mother texted me and asked when you’re coming back.”
“She did?”
“She did.” His thumb moved once at my neck. “And Ari asked if you could come color with her again.”
I smiled before I could stop it.
“What did you say?”
“I said I’d check with your very busy social calendar.”
“Smart.”
“I’m learning.”
He kissed me then, and all of my other questions faded away.
When he pulled back, my family was still loud behind us. My mother was still directing leftovers like a field marshal. Somebody had put on another Maze song. Somebody’s child was crying because they were tired and sugared beyond reason.
It was home. Peace. Love loud and ordinary and all around us.
And standing there with Micah’s hand warm at the back of my neck and his future already reaching toward mine in ways I could actually feel, I knew the thing my heart had been trying to tell me all along.
This was mine.
This was love.
This was real.