Chapter 37 #2
"Trauma-sensitive residential interiors.
Nothing revolutionary on paper, but actually built around autonomy.
Residents choose where possible. Furniture doesn't block exits.
Bedrooms have clear sight lines without feeling exposed.
Locks operate from the inside unless code requires otherwise.
Lighting has layers, not one overhead fixture.
Counseling spaces avoid confrontation layouts.
Kids' rooms look like kids live there." Sunshine stared at me.
"You're doing the thing."
"What thing?"
"The thing where your brain runs faster than everyone else's." Irish had said nearly the same thing about measurements. I smiled.
"Probably." She leaned against the wall.
"Would Thistle telling him simply made the idea more real.
"Thistle & Stone America." Irish went very still. I watched the reaction carefully. His first reaction wasn't excitement but concern, and then he caught himself.
"Your idea?"
"Yes."
"Not because of me?" I appreciated the question more than he knew.
"Not because of you." He nodded once.
"Tell me." I explained Harbor House. The rooms. The standards. The need for restoration and residential design that understood trauma without making survivors feel like patients. Irish listened without interrupting.
"Scotland stays headquarters," I said. "Edinburgh remains the original office. I don't want to turn the company into something else because I happened to fall in love with an American." His mouth moved.
"Happened?"
"Terrible luck."
"Aye."
"But this could be a real branch. Different work. Harbor House, transitional housing, maybe historic buildings being converted for survivor services. Things we already know how to do, only with standards informed by what we learned."
"What does Isla think?"
"I haven't asked." His eyebrows lifted.
"I wanted to know whether it was viable first."
"Very responsible."
"Don't sound surprised." He smiled. Then his expression became serious.
"If you do it, what does that mean for where you live?" There was the question both of us had deliberately refused to turn into a demand.
"I don't know yet." His jaw tightened almost imperceptibly. I continued.
"It might mean more time here. It might mean splitting the year. It might mean hiring someone local once the branch grows. It does not mean I shut Edinburgh."
"Aye."
"It doesn't mean Isla loses her company."
"Aye."
"And it doesn't mean America becomes real while Scotland becomes somewhere I visit." He looked directly at me.
"I know." I believed him. That was the difference. I reached across the table.
"This is me choosing an opportunity." His fingers closed around mine.
"I know."
"Not following you."
"I know, Skye." The quiet certainty in his voice loosened something inside me. I smiled.
"Good."
"When do you call Isla?"
"Now, probably." He stood.
"I'll leave you to it."
"You don't have to."
"Aye, I do." I frowned. He leaned down and kissed my forehead.
"This belongs to the two of you first."
Then he walked away. I stared after him.
There were moments when a person changed so subtly that you didn't recognize the distance they'd traveled until they did something their earlier self simply could not have done.
Irish had just left the room. Not because he was withdrawing.
Because he knew when not to stand in the center.
I called Isla. She answered on the fourth ring.
"Please tell me nobody found another hidden religious compound."
"Not today."
"Excellent."
"I have a business proposition."
A beat of silence passed before she said, "That's somehow more frightening."
I laughed and told her everything, not a version designed to persuade but the full version, including the cost, the risk, the fact that I wanted it, and the fact that America had become part of my life even though I refused to make Thistle & Stone's future a disguised relationship decision.
When I finished, Isla was quiet for long enough that I thought the connection had dropped.
"Say something."
"I'm thinking."
"That's my line."
"No, yours is usually talking while thinking."
"Rude."
"Accurate."
I waited. Then she said, "I like it." My pulse jumped.
"You do?"
"Yes."
"That's not recovery guilt talking?"
"Skye."
"Sorry."
"I'm allowed to make choices." I smiled.
"Yes." She exhaled.
"I don't want to run the American side."
"You don't have to."
"Not now, anyway."
"Okay."
"But I want to help build the standards." I leaned back.
"Trauma-sensitive design?"
"Yes." Her voice changed slightly.
"I know what rooms felt wrong at Croft." My chest tightened.
"Isla."
"I'm not saying I want to relive it. I'm saying if something useful comes out of knowing what made those spaces worse, I want that knowledge to belong to me, not them." I closed my eyes briefly.
"Then we do it together."
"Beside you."
"Beside me." A pause.
"And Edinburgh stays ours."
"Always."
"Then open America." The words hit harder than I expected. I laughed softly.
"You make that sound easy."
"It won't be."
"No."
"But neither were we." I smiled. After the call, I remained at the table for several minutes. Thistle & Stone America looked strange when I first wrote the name, then a little less strange each time I looked at it. Eventually Irish came back carrying two coffees. He set one beside me.
"Well?"
"She said yes." His smile came slowly.
"Proud of you." That affected me far more than stay would have. I stood and kissed him. When I stepped back, he looked at my notebook.
"America?"
"America."
"Scotland?"
"Still home."
"Ireland?" I smiled.
"Also home."
"Carolina?" I touched his jacket.
"We'll see." His eyebrows rose. I laughed and kissed him again before he could complain. The future wasn't becoming simpler. It was becoming larger. For the first time in my life, that didn't feel like losing control. It felt like choosing more.