“Life’s weird that way.”
They reached the truck. Tyler unlocked it but didn’t get in. Stella stood on the passenger side, the folder in her hands now, flipping through the pages.
“It really does all come back to Mum,” she said quietly.
“Yeah.”
“She’s not going to make this easy.”
“Probably not.”
Stella closed the folder. Looked at him across the roof of the truck.
“I still want to stay,” she said. “Even knowing that.”
“Good.” Tyler held her gaze. “Then we’ll figure it out.”
“You keep saying that.”
“Because I mean it.”
She didn’t look convinced. But she got in the truck, and that was enough for now.
Tyler started the engine, then paused.
“Rocky’s?” he asked.
Stella almost smiled. “Yeah. I think this qualifies.”
Rocky’s wasquiet at two in the afternoon — just a couple of tourists studying the menu board and a mom with a toddler making a mess with sprinkles. Tyler ordered butter pecan in a cone. Stella got mint chocolate chip in a cup, because cones were still structurally unsound food delivery systems, even in moments of emotional crisis.
They took their usual bench outside, the one with theview of the ocean.
For a while, they just ate. The folder from Lindsey sat between them, pages ruffling slightly in the breeze.
“You really got detention for climbing out a window?” Stella asked.
“I really did.”
“During a fire drill.”
“I was being efficient.”
“You were being an idiot.”
“Those aren’t mutually exclusive.”
She laughed, and Tyler felt a sense of relief. They were okay. Whatever came next — Fiona, the paperwork, the fight he could feel coming — they were okay right now.
“Some uncomfortable realizations need ice cream,” Stella said, poking at her cup with the tiny plastic spoon.
“Is that a Stella original?”
“It’s a universal truth.” She took a bite. “This definitely qualifies as an uncomfortable realization.”
“Which part?”
“All of it. That I want something this much. That I might not get it. That it all depends on someone who—” She stopped. Poked at her ice cream again. “Someone who might say no just because she can.”
