Page 54 of Only Mine
My wheeze turns into a cough.
“Does not,” I manage, my voice a squeak.
“Does too,” she insists. “He looks at you like … like this.”
She scrunches her face into a very serious expression, crossing her arms. I can’t help but laugh.
“That’s his cranky face, Ivy. He looks at everyone like that.”
“Not you,” she says, then skips off to inspect her next tree.
Ivy’s wrong. She has to be. Yet the small, hopeful part of me that still wants to believe in the impossible—that he could care, that I could be enough—is louder than I’m comfortable with.
Ivy finishes another tree, the bright stripes more chaoticthan the last. When the sky begins to turn a dusky pink, I tell her it’s time for us to go into the house. She heads toward it without complaint, her bare feet leaving a trail of colorful footprints in the grass.
I follow, and once inside, I wipe her hands and face (and feet) with a damp cloth, the water turning a murky brown in the farmer’s sink.
Ivy chatters about her plans for the weekend, some of which involve convincing her father to let her paint the main house.
“Maybe he’ll let us paint the guesthouse first,” I say in a conspiratorial whisper.
“Maybe!” Ivy chirps. “After dinner, can we paint the doghouse? It’s left over from the people who lived here before. We don’t have a dog, but we could get one. Or a cat. Or a rabbit.”
“Let’s ask your papa about a ferret. He’d love it,” I say. “But first, we need to eat.”
I make her favorite: peanut butter and banana sandwiches with a side of strawberries and tomatoes. We eat them on the floor, Ivy’s idea, with a thick blanket spread in front of the fireplace and a stack of picture books beside us.
She stretches out on her stomach, her chin propped on her hands, and listens to me read, interrupting every few pages to ask why a cookie would need to go to school.
I’m halfway through our fourth book when I notice she’s gone quiet. I glance over, and she’s fast asleep, her dark hair curling over her eyes, her mouth slightly open.
Carefully, I gather her into my arms and carry her up to her room and tuck her in.
The house is quiet, the only sound the creak of the floorboards as I make my way back downstairs. I pause in the kitchen, staring out the window at the guesthouse. Thethought of returning to its emptiness tonight makes my stomach twist. I grab my phone from the counter, hesitating.
Ivy’s words—He likes you—are on repeat in my mind.
But they’re quickly drowned out by the memory of Saint’s voice, flat and final:This was a mistake.
I can’t keep doing this to myself. Wishing for something that can never be.
The front door swings open, and Saint’s sudden presence fills the room. I hadn’t heard his car. He stands there, his hair tousled by the wind, but his expression is a void I don’t dare step into.
“Wrenley.”
“Saint.”
The air between us stretches, taut and uncomfortable.
“Ivy’s down,” I say, just to fill the space. “She had a great day.”
One corner of his mouth twitches. “I saw the trees.”
“Sorry if I overstepped. I promise the paint is washable, environmentally friendly, biodegradable, all that stuff.”
More silence. Not tense, exactly, but charged. Like the air before a summer storm.
“She wants to paint the doghouse next,” I say, trying to sound light. “I told her we’d have to ask you first.”
