Chapter 25 Bode
“Your mama’s still up?” I ask, nodding towards the soft glow of her home.
She untangles her fingers from mine to let me throw the truck into park in her usual spot.
Even as she pulls away from me, I can feel the tension start to radiate from her.
She doesn’t say anything as her eyes seem to take in the old home before stopping on something in the distance.
I follow her gaze and see that the lights are still on in the greenhouse.
Her mom’s favorite place. Maggie still hasn’t told me much about her mother’s condition, and she rarely brings her up unless Dot does or we’re alone and I get the courage to ask.
Maggie’s brows pull together just slightly like she’s trying to figure out answers that won’t ever come, and I know the feeling all too well.
Her green eyes finally break from whatever thought she got lost in as my hand finds hers once more, tangling our fingers together. I want to take away the sting the reminders leave behind whenever I can tell she’s been pulled away from me again.
“Hey,” I tilt my head to hold her gaze. “We don’t have to go inside yet. We can stay right here.”
Maggie lets out a breath that’s shakier than I’d like before she leans across the center console, wrapping her free hand around my bicep and burying her face into my shoulder. I don’t waste any time burying my own face in her hair, pressing a soft kiss to the side of her head.
“It’s cold out here,” she complains softly, the sound muffled against my jacket.
My lips turn upwards against her, and instead of urging her to go inside, I reach forward and turn the heater up in the truck. The fan grows slightly louder, and I can feel her laugh softly.
“Problem solved, Wildflower.”
“You’ll run out of gas.”
“Diesel,” I correct softly with a grin.
Maggie pulls back and looks up at me, resting her chin where her forehead just was. “Point still stands, cowboy.”
A soft hum leaves me as I look back at the house, debating what options we have out here.
I’m not going to force her to go inside, where she’s right, it would be warmer.
Not when the Maggie I get to see every day is different than the one I saw when I came to help her get her mama into the truck.
My Magnolia is bright, sunlight-filled, with random facts and stories that half the time aren’t meant for anything or anyone but to fill the silence.
The Magnolia that lives here, she’s quiet, reserved, and the thing I hate the most, sad.
I look back down at her and take the opportunity to lift her chin, bringing her lips to mine.
“It’s your choice Maggie,” I breathe against her, “We can run away, find somewhere else to go tonight… but,” My voice trails off when I feel her hesitation, see it run rampant through the subtle flicker of her eyes to the house and back to me, “I know you, and you haven’t given up on anything yet, so whenever you’re ready to go inside, we’ll go. ”
“We?” she whispers, her eyes searching mine for any doubt or chance that I’ll run.
“Only if you want,” I reply and kiss her softly again, letting it linger for a moment longer than before. It’s Maggie who breaks the kiss this time, still hesitant. “All you’d have to do is ask Magnolia. Day or night, and I’ll be wherever you need me.”
I’m fully aware of how full-on that sounded as it came from my lips, but I mean it with every fiber of my being.
Maggie has me so tightly wound around her pinky, I’m surprised I haven’t keeled over from the number of times she’s had my heart stopped, breath stolen…
I’m turning into Crew, and the part of me that gave a damn left the first time I kissed her.
“Stay…” Her voice is so soft that it almost sounds like a question.
“Are you askin’ or tellin’?” I rasp against her lips.
Maggie’s hand moves from my bicep to curl around the side of my neck, closing the little distance between us to kiss me. “Telling.”
“There she is.,” I smile and steal about ten more kisses from her until we’re breathless and bordering on something I wouldn’t be able to stop.
We climb from the truck, and I follow her up to the front door.
She pushes it open and taps the toes of her boots on the edge of the step to kick off any excess snow before stepping into the warm entryway.
I take her lead and do the same, slipping from my own next to hers as we shrug out of our jackets.
“Jo?” she calls out.
“In here, Maggie,” another older voice calls back.
“Joleen is Mama’s caregiver, well… live-in nurse?” Maggie frowns slightly, “Honestly, she’s whatever Mama needs in a day.”
We round the corner into the kitchen, and I’m greeted with the sight of a woman who looks just as tired as Maggie, but nevertheless warm.
Her soft strawberry curls are unruly around her shoulders, and a pair of black pointed glasses hang off the tip of her nose as she looks up at us from the book she’s reading.
“Joleen, this is Bode,” Maggie says sheepishly, looking up at me. “Bode, Jo.”
“It’s nice to meet you, ma’am.”
Jo leans back in her chair, looking between Maggie and me for a moment before her smile grows softly. “She’s in the greenhouse, it’s been a rough day.”
Maggie only nods, her hand reaching subtly out from behind her, quietly asking for mine. I take it, and she leads me through the kitchen with a soft thank you to Jo.
I’m nervous for her, and the closer we get to the greenhouse, the tighter her grip gets on my hand, not doing anything to quell my own worry of what version of her mother we’ll find.
The sound of soft humming starts to fill the tense silence around us and Maggie stops just inside the doorframe. She presses her back against my chest, and I hold my breath, ready for whatever fallout is about to happen.
“Mama?” she rasps, and her hand trembles softly as she steps forward. Her mother turns at the sound of her name, and it’s like the woman I met before was nowhere to be found. Daphne’s eyes, even as dull as they are, brighten the moment they see Maggie.
“You’re home,” Daphne beams as her frail hands reach out to a bloom of flowers, plucking one and holding it out to her daughter. “Look how well these are growing.”
Maggie looks back at me with confusion, happiness, a torturous mix of emotions, and all I can do is give her a soft nod, urge her to take the fleeting moment of lucidity, and lean against the door frame to watch them.
She kneels in front of her, and Maggie takes the flowers with a soft, tentative smile.
She says something I can’t quite make out, and after a few moments, they move further down the rows of wildflowers.
I want to follow, I want to keep her close, but I know she doesn’t need me for this.
She doesn’t need me around as she slips cautiously back into being just a daughter.
The two of them start discussing something in soft tones.
Daphne’s eyes flicker toward me every once in a while, but for the most part, they’re focused on Magnolia.
I hear Dot’s name mentioned, and then the ranch.
I don’t realize how long I’ve been standing here watching them until Jo nudges my arm gently.
“She’s lucid?” She asks softly not to break the moment between the two women.
I nod with a sigh. “For now, it seems.”
I hear her mom ask about North Carolina, school, and Maggie gently reminds her that she graduated years ago. She’s slipping. I see it in the way Daphne’s eyes start to move into the distance and the way Maggie’s shoulders slowly stiffen.
“You don’t wanna die here baby,” her mama hums, shaking her head as her fingers tear a petal by accident. “There’s a reason wildflowers grow in every season, every terrain. They’re resilient, Magnolia, like you.”
Jo lets out an unsteady breath beside me, carefully watching as Daphne looks up at Maggie with questions behind her gaze.
Maggie sinks to the floor next to her mother and whispers something I can’t make out, but I can hear the tremble in her words.
Daphne’s fingers mindlessly find Maggie’s blonde strands as Maggie rests her chin on her mother’s knee, like she’s back to being a child.
“You have that same look in your eye that Maggie gets,” Jo says softly, looking up at me, and for the first time since she nudged me, I look at her, confused by what she means. “Like you’re afraid to lose something.”
I didn’t expect that answer. I also didn’t expect it to hit me in the chest like a brutal punch as I look back at Maggie.
The truth is, I am terrified to lose something…
someone. The more I watch her and her mother, the more scared I get that when something does happen, I’ll lose Maggie.
That Maggie will lose her sunshine. Her smile.
I don’t know what Jo sees in my expression, but her hand lands over mine as she turns to leave, “Maggie’s been taking care of her mama for a long time. She’s going to need someone to take care of her.” Her head tilts slightly, “You understand what I’m saying?” she asks gently.
“I hear you.” My voice is rough and strangled with emotions I’m not fully ready to feel. I hear a sob break from Maggie, and when I look back at them, Daphne’s expression has gone completely distant. Her soft hum has stopped, and Maggie’s face is buried against her arm.
I take a breath, steeling myself for her and step into the greenhouse to save her sunshine.