Page 72 of Wild Then Wed
My dad used to bring them home folded into damp paper towels, the stems bent, the petals a little bruised from the ride over from the pastures. I was six the first time I planted them—in the corner of the garden bed outside the barn, where the soil stayed warm even in early spring. I used to draw them in the margins of my math homework, tiny and crooked, the only thing I knew how to get right every time.
I press send and it takes him longer to reply this time.
I stare at the screen for a beat, then set the phone face-down on the counter and rinse out my bowl. The water runs too loud in the sink and my brain’s louder, already narrating possibilities that don’t need narrating.
He’s probably just busy. He works more than I do, and I don’t exactly keep a thriving social calendar, so I forget sometimes that most people don’t respond within seconds.
I dry the bowl. Set it back in the cabinet. Turn off the faucet.
When I check again, the message is there.
Sawyer:Pick something else.
I frown. Um. Okay. That’s…weird.
Me:Why?
A minute passes.
Sawyer:Because.
Because?
I stare at it, waiting for…more. A winky face. A joke. Something to suggest he’s being playful or at least sarcastic. But nothing else comes.
Me:White roses, I guess.
I don’t really mean it. They’re fine. Pretty in a distant, glossy kind of way.
His response comes fast. A thumbs-up emoji. That’s it.
No follow-up. No sarcastic commentary. No passive-aggressive flower jokes or fake arguments about whether roses are too cliché.
Just…a thumbs-up.
I stare at it longer than I should.
Something feels off. Not big, not loud—just a small shift. A subtle disconnect from the way he’s been the past few days. He’s been asking questions, sending jokes, pushing this thing forward like he’s determined to make it believable. Asking about rings and venues and what kind of flowers I want to hold in front of people who think they know us. This feels…clipped.
I know better than to read into texts. I know how easy it is to misread tone, how silence can mean a thousand things that have nothing to do with me. He’s probably just tired. Or caught up in something. Or thinking about everything else he has to manage that doesn’t involve me.
Still, it lands. A small sting I wasn’t braced for.
I turn my phone over and press my palms to the counter, grounding myself in the cool surface. It’s nothing, I tell myself. People pull back all the time. Texts feel different than they’re meant to. It doesn’t mean anything. It doesn’t have to.
But even so, it lingers—soft and persistent.
And I feel it anyway.
Chapter 14
SAWYER
Some days, I feel like I’ve been on my feet for eighteen hours straight.
Today’s one of those days.
My last appointment is with a goat named Todd who apparently gets seasonal depression and prefers to wear a baby blue parka when it drops below forty.
