Page 28 of Fire

“First, who says I’m joking? That man is a looker.” She takes a drink, dropping me a wink over the rim of her mug. “But more importantly, it’ll do you good to find the humor in the situation. Life is only as hard as we make it. Hasn’t it been hard enough lately?”

I bob my head. There was a time when I would have laughed my ass off at the insanity of this situation. When I would have sought a solution, then implemented it and moved on. But now, my head is bogged down with self-doubt. With questions and concerns. With the fear that I’m making a mistake by believing Micah, while being so sure most of what he’s saying is true.

Is that age and experience talking?

Or is it Julian’s voice, tearing me down instead of building me up?

“What are you gonna tell Nell?” Grandma asks.

“About which part?” I stare into my coffee. “There’s a lot going on I need to talk about with her.”

I’m leaving Julian.

We’re not going back to Seattle.

She met her father today.

And he offered us a place to stay.

“Do you plan to tell her Micah’s her father before you move in with him? Because that’s what’s happening, right? You’re going to take him up on this offer.” The way Grandma looks at me, like it’s a done deal and a no-brainer. I wish I had a fraction of that confidence.

“I don’t think living together is a good idea at this point.”

“This could be the perfect opportunity to mend your family. To get to know each other and move forward…together. Plus, you’d have a chance to see him without a shirt on and I think we can both admit that would make even the worst day better. We both saw that calendar.”

How can she be so certain of the future when the entire landscape of the past changed an hour ago?

“I don’t think there’s any mending here, Grandma. Micah was pretty upset.” I flash back to the office, where his eyes, normally so kind, blazed with hurt and pain. Micah always looked at me with love. This was the first time it was absent.

“Oh Grandma, I wish I’d called him!” I close my eyes and lift my face to the ceiling as guilt crawls up my spine to whisper in my ear. You make chaotic decisions. You make bad choices. You are the cause of everyone’s problems.

“You played a part in this Ivy, but so did Micah. If he’d told you his parents wouldn’t replace his phone, you wouldn’t have listened to your dad. One call from you could have changed things, but one text from him could have as well. At this point, you can get caught up in assigning blame, or you can make amends, admit mistakes, and figure out how to move forward. The past is over. It only exists in here.” She gently taps my forehead. “All we have is now. And what we do now shapes the future.”

I suck in my lips, inhaling deeply, as if I could breathe in her wisdom without having to learn through experience. “But that past—” I tap my forehead “—it’s been in there for so long. How do I put it down?”

“What you have to decide, sweet Ivy, is how you want your future to look, then make decisions that move you in that direction. Nothing good comes from living in the past. Learn your lessons and move on.”

Outside, Nell dashes through the yard with a palm frond in each hand, the long green leaves arcing behind her like wings. Ten bucks says she thinks if she can run fast enough, she’ll fly. It’s the source of every scrape, bump, and bruise on her tiny body.

I turn back to Grandma. “I guess Micah deserves a say in how…and when…and really even if we tell Nell he’s her father.”

“By making him part of that decision,” she says with a nod of approval, “you’re showing him you’re ready to move forward instead of looking back. You’re giving him the respect a father deserves when it comes to his child.”

“I just don’t know what to do in a situation where Micah might not be the bad guy. I’ve made every single Nell-based decision on my own…”

Grandma frowns and I immediately know what she’s thinking.

“That’s not exactly true,” I say, before she beats me to it. “Julian made a lot of decisions I disagreed with, but didn’t have the strength to fight him over.”

“So this time, be aware of that. Don’t let Micah override you. Hear what he has to say, but make your needs known, too.” Grandma’s smile says she knows that’s not always easy for me. “When are you moving?”

“I don’t know that we are.” I push off the counter and watch Nell through the window. “There’s a lot left unsaid between Micah and me. There was plenty said too. You know, yelling. Name calling. Some blame throwing. We didn’t exactly have a chance to iron out the specifics.”

“There’s your next step, then. Call that man up and start ironing.”

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Micah

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