Page 6 of A Certain Step
WILLA
Spotted a treehouse on our way over. I almost jumped out of the car.
ETHAN
LOL but did you cry?
WILLA
I was so close.
ETHAN
??
Her fascination couldn’t be explained. There was something about them that made her feel like things were going to be okay. It might’ve been silly, but merely looking at one felt like a long, needed hug, an all-time favorite song coming on shuffle right when you need it most, the first sip of coffee—a combination of all her favorite things secured in this small space surrounded by leaves.
Willa was openly crying.No, she was sobbing. Alex looked at Anna like every answer in the world was written in her eyes, stored somewhere only he could see. Their vows were one thing, but the language they spoke in silence was another—tender and intimate.
This was what she wanted. This was why she kept longing for that deeper connection, where the inability to grasp a life without thatperson was a thought too devastating to entertain.
Willa had never felt that before.
She’d begun to think that it was never in the cards for her. But this moment, watching her brother and new sister-in-law slow-dance to Dean Martin’s “Welcome to My World,” was proof of its existence.
Love was indeed a very real thing.
And she wanted it for herself. She didn’t want it from the guy eyeing her from across the room since they got to the venue. She most definitely didn’t want it from Alden Price, her ex-boyfriend, who was convinced demisexuality was a made-up construct, and she’d get over it if she just had good sex.
As if she didn’t wish it could be easy for her to go out there and have a mindless romp.
She heard the host invite all the other couples to join the bride and groom on the dance floor and caught the guy on the other end of the room rising from her peripheral vision. Willa sprinted up and beelined out to the loo.
Hard, definite, no.
Closing the restroom door behind her, Willa leaned against the nearest wall.
There were so many things she appreciated about being half-Armenian, but she loathed so much about how people approached relationships. Armenians in foreign lands often bonded quickly, an inherent effect of the displacement their ancestors faced during the Armenian Genocide, embedding a deep fear in them that someday their entire race would cease to exist. So, even though her family wasn’t close to some of the people who’d been invited, it was done out of respect. She’d deal with the nosey comments for one day and try her hardest not to internalize them. Inevitably, she’d fail at that last part.
At the very least, she’d thus far managed to avoid the one lady who’dbeen actively trying to set Willa up with her son since they were nineteen. Respectfully, no.
Her phone buzzed again. Yet another unfamiliar spark flared inside of her upon seeing Ethan’s name.
ETHAN
What time do you get in on Wednesday?
WILLA
3:17ish
ETHAN
I’m off the whole day. I can come pick you up.
WILLA
You don’t have to do that. We’ll get stuck in traffic.
