Page 66 of Family Bonds: Coy & Angel

“I’d do it if you did.”

“No, thank you,” her mother said. “I’m afraid you’d think of all the times you didn’t get your way as a child to inflict some pain on me.”

Her jaw dropped. “Mom! I’d never do that. Maybe to Spencer, but never you. You’re the one that has been in my corner over everyone else.”

“Someone had to be,” her mother said. “I’ve always known how strong you were. My little fighter. When no one thought you’d make it, you refused to listen.”

She could hear her mother’s voice getting all teary eyed again. It always happened. “That’s right, I’m strong and I wish everyone would remember that.”

“I try to remind your father and brother. Other than work, you’re getting acclimated to the island, I’m assuming?”

“I am,” she said. “It’s not hard to find things. I haven’t needed to go off the island yet. Maybe soon. I’ve been working and on the weekend it’s not like I want to deal with crowds either. I’m ordering pretty much anything I need and Coy has couriers picking things up in Boston a few days a week, so I really don’t have to wait too long for anything.”

“Dare I ask how things are going with Coy?”

She hadn’t told her mother and figured she better do it now.

“They’re great. Couldn’t be better.”

There was silence on the other end. “Meaning what?”

“That we are dating,” she said.

“What?! Since when?”

“A little over a month maybe.”

“Angel! I’m the only one who has known you’ve been in love with Coy for years and you didn’t think to fill me in on this?”

She cringed. “I didn’t know how it was going to go. And maybe I didn’t want advice either. I have to figure it out on my own and I am.”

“Are you going to fill me in on things?”

She debated on what to say and decided to just start at the beginning. “I think Spencer was asking him if I got out much. Spencer was bugging me about it too.”

“He brings it up to me also. I’m not sure why he’s concerned about it when he wasn’t when you were at college.”

“Me neither,” she said. “But over a month ago, it was Friday after work, and Coy asked what I was doing. Next thing I know I’m at his house watching a movie in his theater room, we ordered dinner and then sat on the beach with a bonfire.”

“Sounds like a great first date.”

“It was, but it wasn’t a date to him,” she said. “At least he wasn’t admitting it.”

But he had admitted that his view of her had changed and he was trying to figure it out on his own.

“Then what happened?”

“The following Friday he joked about us doing it again. No movie this time, we played games and then went down by the fire. I tripped in the sand and he caught me. He was close to me and I leaned in and kissed him.”

“Angel!”

Her mother sounded appalled. “What? Someone had to make the move. I mean, give me a break. I wasn’t going to keep visiting to be his friend.”

“What if he didn’t want you to kiss him?”

“Then he wouldn’t have kissed me back. But he apologized and I felt like crap and left.”

“Yet somehow you’re dating?”

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