Page 67 of Raw

Living out there with us would’ve been the easiest solution for her not to be lonely, but this is what she chose and we couldn’t make her come live with us.

“I’ll go check on Vespyr. What time do you wanna leave?”

“I was thinking around six. You have enough time to get comfortable in this house again. It feels better with you all here.”

“I know, Mama.” I kissed her head, then walked across the living room to get to Vespyr’s room.

She was sitting on the bed, just staring blankly at her wall covered in pictures.

“Hey, you okay?” I asked, sitting down next to her and placing my hand on her thigh. “Mama’s taking us to dinner later. At Brian’s.”

“I heard. I don’t really feel like going.”

Just like Papa.

They were exactly the same.

“But you gotta eat something, don’t you? I’m sure Brian’s got some delicious stuff on the menu, especially now that it’s close to Christmas.”

“Yeah, I’m sure,” she replied, her smile tight and not reaching her eyes.

“Hey, I’ll be right there. If it’s because of people staring, embrace it. They’re jealous of what we made out of our lives, so they can judge all they want but they damn well know we’re better off out there than here.”

“I know,” she said, trying not to sound affected by her worries.

“Get those stupid thoughts out of your head, sweet girl. We’ll have a great evening eating dinner with Mama and then we’ll spend the night together. Just us two, watching a movie and snacking on things we can’t have in the forest. How does that sound?”

Her smile grew and her worries vanished slowly, then she nodded and placed her hand over mine. “Sounds perfect. But I choose the movie.”

I laughed and kissed her temple. “No way. That’s my task.”

20

There weren’t many people at the diner, but the ones that were, weren’t ones I wanted to come across tonight.

I tried to look away and not give them anything to stare at, but with the clothes we were wearing, it was easy for them to keep their eyes on us.

I’ve never liked wearing jeans, and it seemed Papa’s and my corduroy overalls didn’t fit in with the rest of the people’s outfits in here.

And there I was thinking corduroy made a comeback.

I liked it, and although I never cared much about what others thought of my clothes, it was hard ignoring their stares.

Especially Kody and Duke’s.

“Come on. We can sit down at that table over there,” Mama announced after she had talked to Dianna.

Fennec’s hand gripped mine, nudging me to continue walking.

“Ignore them. We’ll have a nice dinner and then leave. Keep those pretty eyes on me, all right?”

I smiled at him and nodded, squeezing his hand and then letting him pull me toward the table.

We sat down on one side of the booth while Papa and Mama sat down on the other.

They were so deeply in love, and it showed as they couldn’t take their hands and eyes off each other.

“Good to see all four of you together again. Here for the holidays?” Dianna asked as she stepped up to our table.

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