Page 84 of Tameron

But it always hurt. I imagined it was the same way every Deaf child born to hearing parents felt when they had to sit through their parents’ grieving process.

‘I know.’

He shook his head. ‘No. You don’t understand. I wasn’t upset you could hear. I think hearing is as beautiful as Deaf, Dayton.’ He used my childhood name sign—a D tapped over his heart. ‘You could hear music and laughter and the ocean with your ears. I think there’s joy in that.’

There was. There was joy in experiencing the world the way he did too.

‘But I was afraid again. I was afraid I would fail you. That I would be a terrible dad because I was just learning to love myself as I was. How could I teach you? But I always made you smile. You liked my voice. You liked when I hummed to you.’

I remembered that. There was little tonal inflection, but it was soothing. Every time I was sick, I would lie on his chest. He would hum and I would sleep.

‘I also knew you would always feel like an outsider. Your mom and I talked about this a lot. We never had to worry about Dax or Dahlia. No one in our circle of family or friends would ever look at them like they didn’t belong. No one would ever tell them—’ His fingers shook, and I knew what he was remembering. I remembered it too.

You will never belong.You will always be a guest.

I didn’t want to be a guest in my own home—in my parents’ lives. I didn’t want to be the outsider at every single gathering.

And I wasn’t always—but sometimes, I was.

‘I used to pray to go Deaf,’ I told him.

He bowed his head. ‘I know. I would love you any way you were, Dayton. I love you like this. And I want you to fall in love with the person who makes you feel like your mom makes me feel. I don’t care how they navigate the world. Just…be happy.’

I could do that. With Tameron, it would be easy, so long as he let me in. So long as he wanted to keep me. But I had never really done relationships before. Whether it was me or them, no one had stuck around long enough for me to really call it love.

So maybe I was a little bit broken. And maybe Tameron would eventually see that.

My dad tapped my ankle with his foot. ‘Talk to me.’

‘I’m in love with him, but I don’t know how he feels about me. He has a lot to deal with, and it feels unfair to drop that on him.’

‘I understand.’

‘Do I keep quiet? Keep it to myself?’

His brows furrowed in thought, then his face relaxed, and he shrugged. ‘Be patient with him.’

I was tired of hearing that. I was being patient. That wasn’t the problem. I just wanted to know how long to hold on for. How long did I keep myself on this string, waiting for Tameron to know if this was something he wanted to keep?

“Dayton,” my dad said aloud.

I looked up at him. ‘Sorry. A lot in my head.’

He stood and offered me a hand, yanking me to my feet. ‘Be patient with yourself. Fall in love slowly. Savor it. Understand what forever feels like before you commit.’

I bit my lip. It sounded so…easy. So simple. Yet maybe the most complicated thing I would ever do with my life.

‘How long?’

He smiled at me, then gave my cheek a pat. ‘As long as it takes.’

I suppose I could do that too. After all, if anyone was worth it, it would be my Tameron.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

TAMERON

For soldiers, home was almost always a complicated word. What was home? For some, it meant their partner, their family. Kids. For others, it was a place, like their house or apartment. It could be parents for those who were still young. Heck, I’d had a buddy who swore up and down he wasn’t home until he was with his dog, a badass German shepherd named Gerhard.

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