Page 108 of Brim Over Boot
“Oh, fuck off,” he says. “Don’t humor me.”
“So prickly,” I murmur, positive he can hear the fondness in my tone. His look of befuddlement confirms it.
He shakes his head, continuing with his task. “He grew up speaking and signing equally. Signing was mostly done around the house, since, you know, our town is pretty tiny. Deaf community of one.”
I nod, pulling another clump of bellflowers from its container.
“But it was pretty obvious, even early on, that Remi wasn’t the biggest fan of his implant. It’s why we all learned ASL. As our mom said, the least we could do was learn Remi’s language, the same as he was learning ours. That always stuck with me.”
I hum, my respect for Marigold Darling growing.
“The dates,” Colton says, sitting back on his haunches. “On your arm. What are they?”
Ah.
I hold out my forearm so he can better see the tattoos. “This is my mom’s birthday. And this is my dad’s.”
“To remember them?” he asks.
“Yes.” Although their birthdays aren’t the only tattoos I have to remember them by. I trace the thorned crown that fits my forearm like a band. “This was my very first ink.”
I got it while I was still grieving, just over half a year after my parents died. It felt fitting at the time. A king devoid of life. It was how I felt inside. Hollow. Stripped down to nothing but thorns and bone.
The flowers came after that. New life. Growth. Repair. The rope a lifeline to pull me back to the person I knew myself to be.
It took a while, but I got there.
“How’d they pass?” Colton asks, his question so very soft.
“Accident,” I tell him. “Car crash.”
He makes a small sound. “Seems so unfair.”
I can’t disagree.
“Did you ever go hunting with your dad?” he asks, wiping more dirt across his cheek. At this rate, I’ll have to drag him into my shower before he heads home.
Shame.
“Sometimes, yeah,” I tell him. “It wasn’t just about sport to him. He respected the animals, always. Nothing went to waste.”
“Noah,” Colton says lightly, gentle laughter bleeding into his tone. “I’m not judging. You do remember my family raises beef for slaughter, right? I know perfectly well you can respect the creatures that are part of our circle of life.”
I nod at that, not sure why I thought, even fleetingly, Colton would judge in the first place. I guess I’m used to the reaction from past relationships I’ve had. And I refuse to believe Colton and I aren’t in a relationship.
I just have to get him to admit to it.
“Here,” I say, handing over another clump of flowers, the garden’s yearly revitalization nearly finished. “Back to work, Darling. Chop chop.”
He snorts. “Remind me why I’m here again, letting you boss me around?”
“Because you couldn’t resist the allure of my company,” I tell him, tossing the empty transplant pots into the wheelbarrow nearby.
When I turn back Colton’s way, the look on his face has me holding in a laugh.
“Are you just now realizing you like me?” I ask.
“No,” he says quickly. “That can’t be it.”
