Page 28 of Promise Me This

“I thought those cats belonged to the neighbors,” I ask, but my voice is breathier than I’d like and she continues speaking over me.

“Leona, could you hold Niamh for me?” She finishes, meeting my gaze expectantly.

Everything about me stills, including my heartbeat for a concerning moment. I gaze down at the little girl between us. Her lip quivers in her sleep. My pulse echoes the tremor.

I haven’t held a child since Poppy. Since they laid her little body on my chest, light as a feather but heavy on my heart. If I concentrate hard enough, I can still feel it. The cool metal of her amulet turns to the warmth of her skin against mine. One pound and nine ounces of absolute perfection.

Something shifts in the air between us as Siobhan takes in my hesitation. The quirked edge of her mouth falls, and she turns to look at Callum, who’s staring at me like his glasses aren’t working quite right.

“Erm, I’ve got her, Mam.” He steps forward hesitantly, like he’s waiting for me to object. “But I’m sure the cats are—”

“Thank you, son!” She shifts out from underneath Niamh’s head while supporting it with her arm. Callum slips into the vacated space and tugs the edge of the blanket up around Niamh’s cheek once she’s settled against him.

Before either of us can get a word in edgewise, Siobhan has skittered out of the room.

My gaze finds Callum’s, and we shake our heads in unison. A nervous laugh escapes my lungs, and my attempt to swallow it sounds more like I’m choking.

After clearing my throat for the third time, I finally manage to speak. “What do you think she’s actually doing?”

Callum considers the question for a moment before letting out a heavy sigh. “Probably listening with a cup pressed to the door.”

The mental image elicits a sharp laugh, and I press my lips firmly together to trap the noise before it wakes Niamh and the other guests. If I didn’t know any better, I’d swear the corners of Callum’s lips pitch into the echo of a smile. One blink and it disappears.

Niamh stretches in her sleep, drawing our attention downward. Her tiny foot slips out from underneath the blanket, coming to rest against my hip. I stare at it, counting her toes once and then five more times, before looking away and drawing in a ragged breath.

“What were you dreaming about?”

“Hmm?” I jerk my head back to face Callum. He’s watching me carefully, studying my reaction. I’m too tired, too raw with emotion to hide whatever he’s seeing.

“Upstairs, you didn’t hear me knocking because you were having a dream. A bad one, from the looks of it.” He winds one of Niamh’s curls around his finger before letting it fall back against her cherub cheek. “Do you remember what you were dreaming about?”

I shake my head too quickly, training my gaze on my knees still tucked inside my sweater. The image of a faceless doctor burns the backs of my eyes. He walks into the hospital room where I’ve just delivered my daughter, alive and healthy, and rips her from my arms. I swallow the hard lump rising in my throat as I picture him walking away while Poppy tries her best to cry for me, only no sound comes out of her lungs. When the door closes behind them, it never opens again.

“If you’d rather, we can talk about the market.”

A quick study of my peripheral tells me Callum wants that as little as I do, if his subtle wince is any indication. I stare at Niamh’s toes. It’s easier than facing her dad, though the margin is slim. “I’d rather not. And I can’t remember my dream.”

I don’t know if he’s trying to be more amicable because Niamh is between us, albeit asleep, or what, but he hums his understanding before replying, “I’m the same. Can never remember my dreams, even the good ones. And I’m sorry for not speaking to you.”

“Hm?”

“At the market.”

“I thought we weren’t going to talk about it.”

He holds his hands up. “That’s all I wanted to say.”

I was certain there’d be a whole line of questioning about the stall I was standing at and the tears on my face when he appeared, but maybe he didn’t see any of that. Maybe that moment was mine and mine alone.

I turn to face him, laying my head on my knees. It’s the first time I’ve really let myself drink him in unabashedly since returning, and for a moment I become completely unmoored. He is as familiar to me as my own reflection, and equally as haunting. There’s a lifeline stretching between us, impossibly taut and fragile, and I’m desperate to make it last. A thought pops into my head, and I can’t help myself. “You remember that time you fell asleep on the boat ride to Skellig Michael and shouted Marge Simpson’s name out in your sleep?”

He balks at first, and then his shoulders begin to shake with barely suppressed laughter. It’s the happiest I’ve seen him in my presence since I arrived, and it fills my chest with light.

“What I remember is that you didn’t tell me I did it,” he sucks in air, struggling not to burst into full-blown cackling, “and so I was incredibly confused when the captain kept making wet-dream jokes at me while talking like Homer the whole trip back.”

I bite the inside of my cheek, but a snort escapes my nose. I clap a hand over my face to trap the noise, trembling with the effort.

He shakes his head at me, amusement sparkling in his eyes. “You were certainly something back then.”

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