Chapter 23
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Nora sat behind the wheel of the packed rental car and took one final look at the cottage as the afternoon sun cast its orange glow. “Well, that’s it.”
“Maybe we’ll come back next year,” Gram said, her elbow out the open car window.
Nora offered a courtesy smile, but she was still worried about what next year might look like. As Nora pulled out of the drive heading for the airport, her mind full, Gram’s attention had already flitted off to her phone, seemingly not having a care in the world.
The windy beach road looked different from the night she and Blaze had driven down it in the dark. She sifted through her memories of him: the ice cream they’d shared, their parasailing adventure, walks along the beach, their long talks out on the back porch… Had she overromanticized it all? But he had looked at her with such fondness, and he’d initiated a lot of their outings. Then it was as if, suddenly, he’d changed his mind. How had things gone so wrong? Had she done anything or said anything to cause this? She was just being herself. But maybe she wasn’t enough…
She forced her focus onto the drive. He’d probably decided what she had known all along, but had forgotten thanks to his charm: that they shouldn’t be together. That was that. She was going to try to get on with her summer and not think about Blaze anymore. Just like Gram had said, there was no sense worrying about things she couldn’t change.
Gram’s phone pinged, pulling Nora from her thoughts. She glanced over and saw Gram fire off a text. She never got on her phone.
“Who in the world are you texting on a Sunday?” Nora finally asked.
“Ivy.”
“What?” Nora pulled up to a stoplight and looked over at Gram. “Why?”
“We exchanged numbers while you and Blaze were off parasailing. I’ve been checking in on her to see how she’s doing.”
“How is she?”
“She says she met with the counselor, and she’s not too bad.” Gram typed a line more and clicked off her phone. “I’m surprised Blaze hasn’t filled you in.”
“I still haven’t heard from him.”
“And why haven’t you reached out to him?”
“Because he doesn’t seem to want me to. And it just makes more sense not to.”
Gram sighed. “I’ve been holding my tongue, because your life is your own, but if you want an old woman’s opinion, you need to let go of the rules you set for yourself. They’re unnecessary boundaries. Give in to your feelings for once. I saw the way you two looked at each other.”
Nora put on her blinker and merged onto the highway toward the airport.
“What are you talking about?”
Gram folded her hands in her lap. “Would it really be the end of the world if you dated the father of a student? I’m sure you could get Ivy onto the caseload of the other school counselor if you were up front with the Oakland staff.”
“That’s the least of my worries, Gram. There are plenty of other reasons nothing will happen between Blaze and me.”
“What in the world could they be?”
“Well, for one, I’ll never fit in with his lifestyle. Is he really going to take the school counselor to red-carpet events with all those famous people?”
“That fancy lifestyle has built up around him, but that’s not who he really is,” Gram said. “That was pretty clear during our time together at the cottage. I have it on good authority that Blaze has been down in the dumps since he and Ivy got home.”
Nora glanced over at Gram. “Why? What did Ivy say?”
“Exactly that. She said he seems to be moping around whenever he’s at the house.”
“I doubt very seriously that his mood has anything to do with me.”
Gram pursed her lips and shook her head. Nora flipped on the radio and turned up the music to avoid any further conversation. She had enough on her plate with Gram. She didn’t need any further discussions about Blaze.
But the rest of the drive to the airport, she wondered what had changed his mood.
* * *
By the time they got home from the airport that evening, Gram was exhausted.
“My back is killing me,” she said. “I didn’t realize what a toll travel can take on a body.” She rubbed her shoulder. “But I’m glad we did it.”
Nora dropped their bags inside the apartment. “Me too.”
After Gram retreated to her bedroom to unpack her things and run a bath, Nora went into her room, shut the door, and flopped onto her bed. With all the travel and everything on her mind, she’d been through the ringer. She buried her head in her pillow and relished the smell of home.
Everything had been so much easier before she’d gotten involved with Blaze—if “involved” was even the word for what they’d been. He’d filled her head with all that talk about following her passions, and now she was unsettled and unsure of her direction. He’d wooed her with his charm and gotten her in a muddle when he’d evidently gotten bored with her and decided to move on. While she certainly couldn’t imagine what Ivy’s mother had been through, she’d had a tiny taste of how Blaze could blow through her life and upend it.
The sweet moments between them were what confused her most. He’d been so kind and personable, that even she—who’d sworn off a relationship with him from the beginning—had fallen for him. She needed to get a read on him. And there was only one way to do that.
She pulled her phone from her back pocket and impulsively dialed Blaze’s number. He answered right away.
“Hi,” she said, gathering her thoughts.
“Hey.”
His tone was heavy, but the sound of his voice was music to her ears. Nora swallowed and centered herself.
“My grandmother’s been in touch with Ivy and said you all had your first session with the new counselor. I wanted to see how it went.” She closed her eyes and lay back on her pillow.
“It went fine.”
“I’m glad to hear that. And how’s Ivy? Has she spent any more time with Jake?”
“She’s good. She and Jake are an item, I think.”
“It’s so great that she’s made a friend.” She was already concerned with what a breakup would do to Ivy’s fragile state, but it wasn’t her place to fret over it. “And how are you?”
Silence buzzed down the line before he finally answered, “Fine.”
That was two fines in one very short conversation.
“That’s good.” Her words came out in nearly a whisper. She shouldn’t have called. She should have taken the hint at the cottage. Blaze didn’t want to talk to her anymore. She hadn’t been all that helpful with Ivy, and he had better things to do in real life than hang out with her. She swallowed against the lump in her throat. “I was just… checking in. Glad everything’s okay.” She gritted her teeth when her voice broke on the last word, tears welling in her eyes.
“I’m sorry,” Blaze said.
She cleared her throat. “For what?”
“I didn’t want to hurt you. I’m no good at this.”
“Good at what?” she pressed.
“Nora, I care about you too much to screw this up. And given my history, I’m bound to.”
Screw what up? They’d have to have something for him to be able to screw it up. Her heart hammered in her chest, her pulse rising. He felt it too? She’d tried to ignore her feelings for him, push them away, but they were right on the surface.
“You deserve someone who’ll give you everything, and I don’t think I’m that guy.”
She didn’t know what to say, and her emotions had welled up unexpectedly, robbing her of a good response, so she sat there, silent.
“Well, I have to go,” he said.
“All right,” she managed.
“I’ll see ya.”
He hung up, and Nora dropped the phone onto the bed beside her. A tear rolled down her temple onto the pillow. A page had turned in the story of her life and, stupidly, she’d thought the rest of the book was planned out. But that new page was blank. She wiped her tears and cleared her throat again, and got up to see if Gram was done with her bath and still awake. Maybe she could take her mind off all this.
Thank goodness, her grandmother was watching TV.
“Are you okay?” Gram said from the sofa when Nora plopped down beside her. “Your eyes are red.”
“I’m just tired.”
“If you’re tired, go to bed. That’s what I figured you were doing.”
“I’m tired, but I can’t sleep.”
“What’s on your mind?”
Loaded question. Nora crossed her legs and pulled a throw pillow into her lap. “My future.”
“Oh, that’s deep. No wonder you’re wired. Don’t you want to save that for the morning?”
“I probably should, but I can’t stop thinking about it.” She leaned on the pillow and squeezed her exhausted eyes shut, then opened them when the sting was too much to bear. “Blaze said something when we were together, and it’s bugged me ever since.”
Gram clicked off the television. “What’s that?”
“He asked me what I was passionate about, and I didn’t have an answer for him. Do you know what you’re passionate about?”
“I was passionate about your grandfather. And I’m passionate about family.”
Her answers were quick and decisive, only serving to make Nora feel more inadequate.
“I don’t have anything.”
“Well, the good news is that you’re young enough to figure out what lights your fire.”
“I don’t think my job is my passion.”
“But you’ve spent an awful lot of time outside of school helping Ivy. I’d think that would be a sign of passion.”
Nora chewed on the inside of her lip, not wanting to say what had entered her mind.
“Right?” Gram pressed.
“I think I’m more passionate about Ivy than I am about my job.”
Gram smiled. “She’s easy to be passionate about. I really enjoy her company.”
“I do too.” A wave of sadness overtook Nora. “But I don’t think I’m needed anymore, so what do I do with that passion? Now, when I go to work, I won’t feel the same. I’m already dreading going back if Ivy isn’t there.”
“Lots of people don’t love their jobs.”
She looked into Gram’s eyes. “But shouldn’t we want more for ourselves?”
“Of course we should.” Gram laughed. “But in our limited time on this earth, we’ll have lots of battles, and we’ll have to choose which ones are worth the fight. Is this newfound apathy over your job worth the upheaval of finding something else? Only you can answer that.”
“I don’t know.” Nora shook her head. “I don’t feel like I know anything anymore.”
“You’re too young for a midlife crisis,” Gram teased. “You have time to figure it out.”
“And how am I supposed to do that?”
“Think you’d like to paint? Buy canvases. Think you’d like to garden? Get yourself a basil plant and see how you do. Maybe cooking is your thing. Take a class. Just lean into what you like.”
“Blaze said to think about what I would do if money were no object, and I said I’d like to travel the world.”
Gram closed her eyes and cooed. “That would be a dream, wouldn’t it? To wake up in a cozy bed and breakfast in the Cotswolds, with rolling hills of green as far as I can see and rain beading on my window, as I sit by candle light… Mmm.”
“That would be incredible,” Nora said. “But I have responsibilities.”
Gram’s gaze shifted downward. “And what if you didn’t have those responsibilities? Would you go then?”
That lump formed again in Nora’s throat. There was only one way she wouldn’t have those responsibilities, and she didn’t want to think about it. “I would choose the responsibilities over travel, but even if I had no responsibilities, what would I buy a ticket with—my good looks?” she teased. “Because that wouldn’t get me much.”
Gram brightened. “Oh, phooey.” She slung a pillow over to Nora in mock disgust. “You could buy a thousand tickets with your looks.”
“You find me the ticket salesman that agrees with you, and we’re off to Europe.”
Gram laughed, the sound like windchimes. It was so nice to hear her laugh.
Nora could easily slip back into worry over her grandmother, but she decided to stay in the moment. Don’t ruin this .
But Gram sobered. “You know what I’d like to tell you about your life?”
“What?”
“Enjoy the moments when you don’t know what’s next. Be excited about them.”
“Why would I be excited when I have no plans?”
“Because those moments are the slip of time before God reveals your next big journey.”
Gram’s words tingled down her spine. “I love that.” She moved the pillow to the corner of the couch. “You’re so right. I shouldn’t worry so much.”
“There’s nothing really to worry about. Your future is going to happen. I’ll be gone one day, and—God willing—you’ll get old. Those are the only two real absolutes. The rest is entirely up to us.”
“I love you, Gram.”
“Love you too, dear.”
Before Nora climbed into bed, she texted Blaze.
I know you don’t have it all figured out, and I don’t either. But I’m happy being friends.
She didn’t get a response and, eventually, she fell asleep.