Page 67 of Promised Secret
My resolve cracked just a bit, because if I was being completely honest, Sandra was really the only mom I knew, since my own passed when I was born. Mylao-badid his best with me, but it was really Sandra who showed me comfort in a way I’d never known. I loved her like she was my own.
I had wished for her to be my maternal figure…just not as a stepmother.
“Before I knew about you and mylao-ba,I dreamed about you becoming my mother-in-law,” I admitted bashfully.
Sandra laughed and pulled me into a hug. With our height difference, I sat taller than her, but she used her powerful hands to pull my head into her chest. She wrapped me up in the same motherly hug she’d given me throughout the years, even after I’d refused to call her “mom.”
“Be it stepmom or mother-in-law, it doesn’t matter tome. I’ll always be your family. Even without Clay, you’ll always be my boy,” she said, voice choked.
I felt the frog in my throat, too. Her hugging me right now meant more to me than she could ever know. These past few years, with all my failed attempts to get over my feelings for Clay, I’d lived in constant fear that one slip would cost me my family.
Sandra had probably been worried about the same thing, too.
“If you two are serious about being together, then I can’t think of any two people more meant for each other,” she murmured.
I pulled myself from her arms. “Are you saying you’re not against us being together?” I asked with surprise. “Isn’t that the entire reason you kept trying to set Clay up with other people?”
“It’s true I was anxious to get him meeting people after I heard around town that you haven’t been dating as much anymore,” she said.
“Don’t these people have anything better to do than keep track of my dating life?” I muttered, and she laughed. Sandra was in the camp of people who thrived on small-town gossip.
She swept back my bangs that now hung way past my eyes. I’d never gotten around to asking her to cut them for me.
“I figured since you two never got together after all these years, it might be better if Clay got with someone else rather than rock the boat. I worried that if you twodid end up dating and broke up, then what would happen to our family?”
I nodded with understanding. “I have the same fears,” I admitted. “I don’t want to disappoint mylao-baor you, but I’m not as selfless as you two were. Even if you guys don’t approve of our relationship, I can’t give Clay up.”
“You really love him, huh? That was a stupid question. Of course you love him. And there’s no question that Clay loves you, too,” she said with a smile.
I smiled, too. “He’s my life.”
She took my hand again. Her hand was warm and gentle in mine.
“You know I did a lot of thinking last night—stayed up most of the night thinking, if I’m being honest. You two were always close, but it wasn’t like you never fought. In fact, I’d like to say you two bickered more than you got along.”
I muttered unintelligible excuses under my breath, which only had Sandra laughing again. It was always my feelings for him that led me to fight with Clay so much. I’d get jealous of the people around him and start bickering with him. Thinking back on it now, it was probably the same for Clay.
“You two have a lifetime of fighting, yet refused to leave each other. If that isn’t proof enough that you’ll stick through thick and thin, then I don’t know what is,” she teased.
“Does that mean…” I asked hopefully.
She nodded. “If you and Clay are happy, then I will be too.”
I pounced and hugged her so tightly she groaned at the impact. Sandra laughed and hugged me back.
“I love you, my boy,” she whispered. And for the first time, hearing her call me that didn’t fill me with dread.
Chapter Twenty-Four
CLAY
I knew Dan was plotting something when I couldn’t find him for lunch. My suspicions were confirmed when I received a call from my mom asking me and Dan to stop by after work for dinner.
She’d confirmed that Dan had visited her that morning, and they’d had a long, heartfelt talk about us. She told me she was on our side, and she would always be on our side.
Dan fought for me.
He worried so much last night that I wondered if he’d run away and choose the family instead of being with me. Hislao-bawas important to him since it’d been just the two of them since he was born. But he didn’t run. He stayed and fought for me, and I didn’t know how I wasnotsupposed to be giddy about that fact.
