Page 86 of The Devil Wears Tartan

“Well, we mustn’t have that.” She sits back up and gets to her feet. “I’m going to go finish my laundry, but you come get me if you need me, okay?”

I nod. “Thank you, Mum. You’re kind of the best.”

She lifts her eyebrows. “Kind of?”

I laugh. “You are the very, very best, and I love you.”

“I love you too.” She heads for the door but pauses before she leaves. “Don’t give up on her, sweetie. Not yet. Something tells me you two were only getting started.”

A lump rises in my throat, and all I can do is nod as she steps into the hallway and pulls the door shut behind her.

Something tells me Kenzie and I were only getting started too, but the rest of me already believes we’ve reached the end.

CHAPTER 20

MOIRA

Kenzie doesn’t show up to the next Tartan Tea. I utterly fail at being subtle when I ask five different volunteers if they know whether she’s said anything about attending, but nobody has any answers for me.

I text her for the first time in over two weeks after I get home from a day spent slicing up baked goods and watching kids dance around to bagpipes. I could barely hear the music, and my eyes kept drifting to the door, searching for any sign of her grey pea coat or the flash of her ponytail whipping around the corner.

Her reply arrives a day later. The text comes through while I’m scrolling through Instagram in between classes at the Murray School, and I sprint to the supply closet as soon as I see it pop up on my screen.

Whatever the message says, I don’t want to be out in the open when I read it.

I’m already shaking when I pull our conversation up. I don’t even bother pulling the cord for the overhead light. I hunch over the glow of my phone in the dark and drag my eyes over her message:

Chris is much better now. He went back to his place. Thanks for asking about him, but I don’t think we should talk anymore. I meant what I said. I shouldn’t have said it so harshly, but it’s true. I just can’t do this, and it would be better if we stopped texting. Please don’t message again.

I sag against the shelving unit behind me. My heart is pounding so loud in my ears I can’t hear the drone of bagpipes and the shouted instructions from the studio across the hall. I can’t even feel the phone in my hands anymore.

She really does mean it. She’s giving up on us.

My chest feels hollow, and I have to remind myself to breathe.

“It’s okay,” I whisper into the dark of the closet. “I’m going to be okay.”

I don’t know how long I stand there before I get a grip on myself. As soon as I do, the first flash of anger singes through me.

She says we can’t do this, but she won’t even try. She says I don’t fit in her life, that I won’t understand, that she’ll lose everything if she tries to keep me, but even though I’m sure there really is a lot I don’t understand, I’m also sure she doesn’t understand me either.

She doesn’t understand how much I can take. She doesn’t understand how hard I can fight. She doesn’t understand just how far I’m willing to go for the people I care about. I thought she saw my strengths better than I did, but she’s turning a blind eye to them all now.

I click off my phone screen and drop my arms to my sides, blinking as my eyes adjust to the hint of light shining through the gap at the bottom of the closet door.

I’m not going to grovel anymore. My heart is breaking for her and all she’s been through, but I can’t keep pouring myself into texts and phone calls just to keep getting pushed away.

Just like my mum said, I have to accept the truth about myself, and the truth is that I’m worth trust. I’m worth a chance.

I take a deep breath and pull the door open, stepping out into the light.

* * *

The next couple weeks fly by in a blur of dance classes, training sessions, and long hours spent hunched over my desk working on university finals.

I’ve thrown my cracked and bruised heart into the studio with everything I’ve got, and the proud smiles on my students’ faces when they smash all their dance goals is slowly patching me up. They might just be kids learning Scottish folk dances, but they’re going to grow up and make their mark on the world someday. If I can give them even an ounce more confidence on their way to discovering who they are and what they want to be, I’ll have done something worthwhile.

“And that’s enough,” I mutter to myself as I lift a pile of heavy garment bags off of the backseat of my family’s station wagon.

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