Page 143 of Fire and Icing

Am I acting a little unhinged? Maybe. She’s here. In town. She’ll always be here. I just have to find her—see her, maybe even hold her. She has no idea how I feel right now. We’ll get through this. I don’t know what the solution will be, but we have to find one. And I don’t only need to see her for me. I know she needs to see me as much, or more, than I need to see her. She might have her arms crossed over her chest, but behind that she’s reaching out for me, hoping I don’t reissue the wounds others left on her heart.

I get it. I know her. And I love her.

I’m not like them. She’ll see that, in time.

I pull up in front of her house—the place I first met her. I smile, remembering how feisty she was and all the work it took to break through the walls she had erected against me. But then I got the prize. She let me in. And I got to see the real woman behind all the attempts to keep me at bay. She was worth the wait. And now, she’ll be worth the fight.

I climb the porch steps and knock on Emberleigh’s door. She doesn’t answer at first. But her car’s in the driveway.

She’s here.

I knock again. “Em, I know you’re in there.”

I wait. “I just want to talk. Can you open the door?”

To my relief, the door opens and I get my first glimpse of her. It’s like coming up for air even though she looks weary. Guarded, but not hostile.

“So, you moved back home?” I ask, kicking myself for not having a better leading line.

“Yes.”

“Gran said you’d gone.”

“I didn’t plan to leave today. My house was finished so …”

“So you moved home. Of course. That makes sense. Were you going to tell me?” My voice has a note of accusation that I wish I could erase as soon as I hear it.

“Of course. Yes. I’m not hiding from you.”

I stare at her, my brows raised. She’s hiding. We both know it. I’m not blaming her for how she’s processing her feelings and the uncertainty of our future right now. I just don’t want her trying to pretend she’s not avoiding me when she obviously is.

“Much,” she amends. “Not hiding much.”

I smile. “That’s more like it. And you can hide from me if that’s what you need to do. But may I point out one thing?”

“Sure.”

She swings the door the rest of the way open and stands there, facing me from inside the house while I’m still on the porch.

“You left,” I say, gently. “I’m here. Hunting you down. Searching the town to find you. I didn't leave. I went looking. I just want that to be noted.”

“It’s noted.” Emberleigh smiles softly.

It’s like a crack in a wall where the sun shines through. Not enough to bust through the wall, but enough to tell you the wall will crumble over time.

“This isn’t easy, Dustin. If we both knew you were just going to record a demo and then life would resume as it was, I’d be throwing you a party.”

“Really? Would you bake the cake?”

“Dustin.”

“Okay. Okay. Just, I’d really like you to bake me a cake.”

She shakes her head, smiling softly. I am incorrigible. I know it. She knows it. She loves it. I think she loves it, anyway.

Her face grows serious again. “The point is, we don’t know where this will lead. And you can’t promise me this will end up with you staying here in Waterford.”

“I can’t,” I admit. “But I can promise you that you matter more than a career in the music industry.”

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