"Wyatt—"
"I know we said friends. I know we're taking things slow, figuring out how to be in each other's lives without destroying each other again. But Ivy..." I took a breath, decided on honesty. "Watching him put his hands on you, claim you, try to diminish you—I wanted to tear him apart. That's not friendship. That's something else."
"Something else," she repeated softly.
"Something that never went away, no matter how hard I tried to kill it. Something that's only gotten stronger since you've been back."
She stood and came to stand beside me at the rail. Not touching, but close enough that I could feel her warmth, smell the mixture of sunshine and dust and something essentially Ivy.
"I'm scared," she admitted. "Last time we tried this, it nearly destroyed us both."
"We were kids then. We're different now."
"Are we? You still have a temper that runs hot. I still have a tendency to run rather than fight."
"Maybe. But you didn't run today. You stood and fought. And I didn't lose control, not completely."
"Because we're different," she said slowly, like she was just realizing it. "We're still us, but... more. Scarred maybe, but stronger."
"Strong enough to try again?"
She looked up at me, and I saw my own hope reflected in her eyes. "I'm not going anywhere now. The job, the position your Dad offered—I'm here for good."
"I know."
"So we have time. To figure this out. To do it right."
"All the time in the world," I agreed.
She smiled then, a real smile that lit up her whole face, that made her look like the girl I'd fallen in love with and the woman she'd become all at once. The lightness that had been missing since she'd returned, that had been buried under secrets and pain and the weight of the past, finally surfaced.
"Hey, Wyatt?"
"Yeah?"
"I'm home."
Two words, but they changed everything. Not 'I'm back' or 'I'm staying' but 'I'm home.' Present tense. Permanent. A statement of belonging that no contract or job offer could provide.
I reached out and took her hand. Her fingers intertwined with mine immediately, naturally, like they'd been waiting fourteen years to come back to where they belonged.
"Yeah," I said, squeezing gently. "You are."
Behind us, the screen door opened, and Mom appeared. "Dinner's almost ready. And Ivy? I've already called Sarah Chen and Chuck Garrett. They want to meet Tuesday to discuss the cooperative idea. News travels fast around here."
"That's... efficient," Ivy said, but she was smiling.
"That's family," Mom corrected. "We take care of our own."
As Mom went back inside, Ivy and I stayed on the porch, hands still linked, watching the sun paint the ranch in shades of gold. The creek glittered in the distance, the same creek where we'd made promises as teenagers, where everything had fallen apart, where maybe—just maybe—we could build something new.
"What are you thinking?" she asked.
"That Creek runs toward the future, not the past," I said. "Maybe we should follow its lead."
"Toward the next chapter?"
"Toward whatever comes next. Together this time."
