Page 58 of Promise Me This

“What is it that keeps you up, then, if I may be so intrusive?” Her tone is gentle, open to being shut down. The dim light cast from the fireplace softens her wrinkled features while making her gray hair shimmer. She looks ethereal, like a wise enchantress from one of the fantasy novels I’m now restacking in alphabetical order.

I don’t know if it’s the cocoon of night or her willingness to go unanswered, but I find myself wanting to offer her some truth, even if it is sparse and mostly useless.

“The way I left things with Callum still haunts me in a lot of ways.” I offer a grim smile to the bookshelf, unable to face her while I speak. “He deserved better than I gave him.”

“But you’re here now,” she replies, her voice laced with forgiveness that I could never offer myself. “That’s got to count for something, right?”

My shoulders fall, the effort to hold them up suddenly impossible. The nightmares have gotten worse as Callum and I have gotten closer, leaving me raw and ragged at the edges, with tendrils of my resolve trailing behind me. I turn to her, taking in the genuine interest and compassion filling her expression. It makes me brave for just a moment. “You don’t think it’s too little, too late?”

She shakes her head. “No such thing.” Her arm extends from where it was resting on the back of the couch, and then her hand is dangling in the space between us, palm up. I take it, and she cradles my hand gently, as though it is breakable. “Besides, as happy as he’s been now that he’s gotten over himself, I’d say you’ve more than made up for the way you left. You were young then, Leona. You’ve got to give yourself a little grace.”

Tears prick at the backs of my eyes. I glance at the floor while blinking them away. I want so badly to accept her words, to let them wash over me and make me clean, but there are sins she doesn’t know about. Ones I doubt she’d find as forgivable as simply cutting off contact with her son.

It hits me then, the fear of not only Callum’s reaction but Siobhan’s. I realize how deeply I respect her, how much I want her to respect me. To trust me. How will she feel when she realizes I kept the knowledge of her first granddaughter from her? How will she ever look at me the same way?

She won’t. And it’s something I need to accept. I can build these bonds all I want, but they are walls made of sand. When the tide comes in, when I finally tell the whole truth, they’ll all be washed away.

“You’re good for him, Leona, whether you believe that about yourself or not.” She offers me a close-lipped smile when I finally face her again. “And you’re certainly good for me.” Her tone shifts, lightening up. “This place has never looked so clean or done so well, if I’m being honest. Callum has helped where he can, and I do my best with it, but you’re really something special. This inn”—she gestures to the ceiling, and the rooms beyond it—“is my baby. The only thing that’s ever been truly mine. After Callum’s dad left, I spent those years in the city raising him as best I could. And his granda helped, giving us the summer cottage to escape to on the weekends. And then my brother, bless him, took Callum under his wing at work.

“But with him grown and gone, I had nowhere to pour myself into. Buying this place with the money my father left me when he passed was the first thing I ever did just for me. Not for my ex-husband, not for Callum. For Siobhan.” She smiles. Her gaze is faraway, and I don’t dare to interrupt, to break the enchantment. “I love it. And it does my heart good to have someone else love it just as much. Especially as I’m getting older. It’s hard to keep up with it all.”

She rubs her hands together, marveling at the wrinkles there. I wonder if the age surprises her as it creeps up, the way it does for me. I don’t know when I began measuring my age as a yardstick from the date Poppy died, but for the past few birthdays all I could think was, It’s been ten years. Eleven years. Where did these gray hairs come from? How have I aged when my own reason for living never will?

“Well,” my voice croaks on the word, but I press on, “I’m honored to get the chance to help.”

Now the smile is for me, a precious gift, and I tuck it away into my heart for the day when she will no longer look at me with such graciousness.

The air grows heavy around us, not like a weight but like water, the way floating in a pool feels the same as being held. I want to stretch that feeling out. I don’t want to go back to my cold bed and nightmares.

Tentatively I push my luck. “What happened with Callum’s dad, if you don’t mind me asking?”

Whether it is a gift of the years that have passed or her own work to overcome it, or both, she barely reacts to the question. A wince that is hardly more than a blink, and then she’s recovered.

I remember Callum telling me his dad wasn’t in the picture, that he hadn’t been for much of Callum’s life, but I never pressed for more information. Questioning him felt like being offered a look at someone’s wound and then jamming a finger into it. Which I guess is what I’m doing now, but the wound seems a lot less raw for Siobhan than it did for her son.

With a sigh, she pats the cushion next to her, and I come around to join her on the sofa, abandoning the remaining stacks of books.

“Callum was—is—my life. And now Niamh is, too. But sometimes people stumble into being parents, rather than planning for it and desiring it with their whole hearts. And when that happens, half the people stumble into the purpose of their existence, and the other half fall into a role they didn’t know they never wanted until it was theirs.

“I knew I wanted to be a mam, and Callum’s father obliged, but when it came time to be a parent, he found the suit didn’t quite fit.” Her expression sours around a rueful frown. “In fairness, once that boy came along, I gave all of myself to him. I didn’t leave anything else for my marriage. That wore on his father. Can’t say I blame him.”

A pang in my heart hits without warning, stealing my breath away. I recognize myself in her words, and it’s a difficult mirror image to behold. “You were just doing what any good mom would do.”

Her gaze is haunted as it holds mine intently. “I had my reasons. Some he understood, and some that only made sense to me.” Those words hang in the air between us, heavy and full. I’m almost certain if I reached out, I could gather them in my hands. “I’m sure you had your reasons, too.”

The way she’s looking at me, like she can see all the way through to the ugliness, sends ice running through my veins. A shiver skitters down my spine, and she offers me her shawl, which I decline. “I think I’m actually going to head up to bed.” I fake a yawn that turns into a real one. I’m hoping I can do the same thing with sleep. “Thank you for checking on me. I’m sorry for waking you.”

She pats my knee, a claddagh ring that I’ve never noticed before glinting on her finger. “No need to be sorry. You’re not the only one who has things that keep her up at night.”

She rises from the couch and pads across the intricately designed rug, then the hardwood floor, the swish swish of her nightgown highlighting her steps. Halfway into the dark corridor, she glances over her shoulder, holding on to the doorjamb for support. “Try to get some rest, Leona. You deserve it.”

With that, she disappears. I douse the fire, waiting for each shimmering ember to die off, remembering a city skyline that twinkled in the same way from my vantage point high on a mountain. When at last it goes dark, I make my way upstairs, still unable to believe her.

Chapter Twenty-Four

Callum

“Would I be seeing a lot more of my son because you love me so much,” Mam says by way of greeting, “or because a certain brunette upstairs has captured your attention?”

---