Page 57 of Something Like Sunflowers

I lunge forward. “Don’t touch her!” My voice is thick and commanding, assertive and menacing in a way it’s never been before. It’s me, the happy-go-lucky class clown. The boy who charms your southern mama and steals a cola from your fridge on the way out.

That boy is gone. The one standing in his place is a man ready to fight anyone, including his girlfriend’s own mother, if she so much as touches his girls.

“What has gotten into you, Hunter Isaac?” Mrs. Campbell shrieks, placing her arm in front of her daughter in a show of protection, which is just fucking laughable. She’s protecting Dev? With calorie counting? Reverse psychology? With tanning beds and juice cleanses? Naw.

Hell, naw.

“What’s wrong is that I don’t appreciate you making her feel like shit for what she looks like or how much she weighs!” Devyn’s eyes are glassy with the promise of tears, but true to her nature, she doesn’t let them flow down her perfectly made-up face. Anything so her mother still thinks she’s pretty.

It’s messed up, but that isn’t Devyn’s fault.

She sniffles, smiling at me, and even though she’s sad and confused, my heart soars when I see the sparkle still there in her eyes. It’s not dull. Not like her mother’s.

Not anymore.

How could it be? We have each other. We have our girl.

For a moment, I let myself live in the bliss that will be our life together, and I smile down at the beautiful, perfect girl in my arms. Not a pageant queen or the star of the dance team, but so much more. The girl who made summer camp magical and Monopoly unbearable. The one who chucked a roller skate at my head for making fun of her ballgowns, but still let me lead her across countless dancefloors wearing them.

The girl who holds my baby inside her. She’s mine to take care of now.

“I’m taking her out to eat as much as she damn well pleases,” I tell a still shocked Mrs. Campbell. She doesn’t do anything, though, just lights up one of her Virginia Slims and throws her satin robe back over her camisole and shorts, mumbling something about the party and what the neighbors will say if the Junior Miss Southern Rodeo Queen isn’t there… not Devyn…The Queen.

And with Dustin, it’s always The Grades. The Sports. The Reputation. My fist curls at my side, and it’s all I can do not to punch a hole in the wall with the anger I feel toward this woman who raised two of the best people I know. And she doesn’t even see how amazing they are. She just picks and picks and picks.

“I don’t give a shit what they say,” I tell her.

But her eyes rear back angrily, scorching me with a fire I wasn’t sure Mrs. Campbell even had left inside her. I can take it, though. I’ll fight any fire-breathing dragon for the right to save my princess. Forever and always.

“She needs to be back for the party.” She points her long, manicured finger at me. Funny how someone can pay thousands for beauty and still be genuinely ugly at their core. She casts her gaze down on Devyn, her own daughter, who she should love and adore no matter what she looks like or what the number on the scale might be, and my breath stills in my lungs, because all she looks…is disgusted by her. And by me.

“You! You are just like your mother,” she hisses. “Always trying to save everyone.” Her lip curls up in a penetrating sneer, and it stings to hear mention of my mother from such putrid lips. Mrs. Campbell’s eyes flare when she hears my sharp inhale, and she digs her talons in deeper.

“What you need to realize, and what your poor mother never could, is some people simply aren’t worthy. And they must learn to save themselves.”

Devyn gasps, putting a hand to her side in a way that her mother won’t notice, but I can feel, being pressed against her.

“Hurts,” she whispers into my chest, pressing her face against my shirt. And I’m not sure if it’s the pain in her side she’s talking about or her mother’s words. Either way, we’re done here.

I stand, locking eyes with the woman who somehow created the angel currently lacing her fingers through my own and shake my head. I remember a time when she wasn’t like this.

Or do I?

“One day,” I say, “I hope you sober up and see how amazing your children are. I only wonder if you’ll be worthy of their love when that day comes.”

I lightly tug Devyn’s hand and lead her out the door, brushing past her mother, like the knight in all those books from years ago. Saving my princess from the castle, whisking her away to a kingdom all our own.

Giving her the Happily Ever After she deserves.

We’re halfway to the Sugar Stable when Devyn finally speaks. She’s been crying softly for about five minutes now since we left her house, the emotions of the fight with her mom finally hitting her, I guess. Or maybe she’s just comfortable enough with me to cry. I smile at that thought, but only a little. I can’t smile for long when Devyn’s hurting.

“Ellie,” she says, sniffling and wiping her tears on the back of my hoodie sleeve. I gave it to her to wear when we got in the car because she was cold, and because I love the little humming sounds she makes when she smells it, because it smells like me.

“I want to name her Ellie.”

“Ellie.” I test out the name. It rolls off my tongue easily enough, and even though I won’t tell her this, I was going to say yes to any name she finally settled on regardless of what I want. I couldn’t want anything more than my two girls healthy and happy and home…with me. I want us to create a life for our daughter that is filled with love and comfort and happy family memories. Ones that don’t include weigh-ins or divorces, deaths and custody fights, social services, and hidden pregnancies.

Fuck, our parents didn’t know what the hell they were doing.

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