I’ve watched Bea have a few disasters, and then there was the time working on myself, learning how to be part of a family in a healthier way, then finding my job, so dating has never taken priority.
Not to say I didn’t scratch an itch here or there, but I should not have scratched an itch with Oliver.
Not when I was already starting to fall for him.
And now—has he truly never stopped to smell a rain shower?
How is that even possible?
“Rain smells different in spring than it does in summer and in fall,” I tell him.
“How so?”
“In spring, it smells like the world is waking up from a long, cold slumber after the longest night of the year. Like flowers and sunshine are coming, even if they aren’t here yet. In the summer, it smells like relief from the heat. Like the earth needed to jump into a swimming pool to cool down. In fall, it smells like nature is taking a shower to get ready for bed. Winding down. Putting all of its leaves away and letting the grass turn brown like I’d take off my makeup and soak in the tub for a while before going to sleep.”
He's watching me without looking straight at me, like he too is realizing we’ve made our lives a lot more difficult.
Like I need to leave this road trip and go back to Athena’s Rest and keep my freaking mouth shut, and he needs to go on without me.
That would be best.
To pretend this never happened.
“So this is summer cool-off scent?” he says.
“You’ve never stopped to smell the rain? I know you’veseenrain. Everyone’s seen rain.”
He shakes his head and looks back across the parking lot. “When your life is one day after another after another of living up to expectations, with boxes to check and priorities set for you before you’re born…”
I wrap my arms tighter around myself so I don’t hug him.
That wasn’t my life, but it could’ve been.
If Margot hadn’t so firmly taken the role in our family that Oliver filled in his.
Oldest or only child.
Expectations from birth.
Trained for this.
Madefor this.
And so very proficient that I didn’t have to be the backup.
You can’t tell me my parents and his parents didn’t talk more about having an heir than they did about having a baby when they decided it was time. I know my parents. I know his parents. I wouldn’t believe you if you told me they wanted to have a baby for normal instinctual reasons.
They wanted to see their family lineage and empires continue to grow under the next generation and the generation after and the generation after that too.
They didn’t have us so that we could take flight and be whoever that magical little spark that made us who we are christened us to be.
He takes another deep breath, like he’s trying to imprint the smell of summer evening rain onto his soul.
I hold my hand out under the overhang to feel the cool drops that are pattering softly over the parking lots. “Have you ever won a giant stuffed animal at a carnival game?”
“I can hear my father asking why I’d waste my time on a game rigged against me when I have the money to buy the damn stuffed animal.”
Mine would ask the same. “What about getting your fortune told?”
