Caroline giggled, obviously having gotten a full run down from Danger. “Danger trapped them at lunch the other day. Said you coulda cut the tension in his office with a knife.”
Ginny growled low so as not to wake the baby or alert the man on the lawn, who they were quite unmistakably discussing, but her anger with her sisters had all but dissipated. Maybe the babywasa good distraction. “Do you even have photos to look at tonight, you schemers?”
“Of course we do.” Georgia hopped off the swing and pulled out a small printer box hidden beside the wicker chair where Gus slept peacefully, passing gas between purrs. “Look, I already found some great ones. I really do need photos for the Homecoming Dance and then some are going in the time capsule.” She flipped the lid and pulled a stack out, handing them over to Ginny, who in turn, handed the sleeping baby over to his mother.
Ginny looked through the photos slowly. One of Georgia and Caroline before the Snow Ball, Georgia’s senior year, where Georgia was to have met Lakeland as her secret date, only to be stood up. She then lived the next six years under a giant misunderstanding. But it had turned out to be in God’s perfect timing, for when they reunited, it was clear Lake and Georgia belonged together.
Next, a photo of the whole family cheering Dakota on at a football game, dressed head to toe in Sugartree purple.
Another captured the moment Georgia, Ryan, and Blaire had saved their college acceptance letters to be read together. All three were open mouthed, clearly screaming in excitement. Ginny remembered watching them with Dakota and Caroline at her side, laughing at their hysterics, but sad her big sister would be leaving their family behind.
One caught a moment of unbridled rage between Dakota and Sadie that Ginny had taken a quick snapshot of and texted on their group thread, knowing they’d probably frame it and put it on their mantle.
Ginny smiled, looking at another from her own senior year. She and some of the youth group girls had decorated the entrance to Living Hope Church for the themed VBS that summer. The photo showed Georgia piggybacking Lake while he held streamers in his hands. Caroline was in a striped summer dress, her arm around Sadie’s waist so they could pose cheek to cheek. A crowd of the youth posed in the back row with silly faces and in various states of mayhem, but Ginny’s eyes and face were turned to her left, where Ryan had casually placed his arms around her and Dakota’s shoulders.
She tucked the photo in her shorts pocket and handed the stack back to Georgia. “Okay, listen. I love you guys, and I know your hearts were in the right place.”
“They really were. We love you, Gin. You haven’t dated in a while, and we thought after Kota and Sadie left… well…” Caroline gave her a tender smile. “We thought you might be lonelier than you’re letting on, and we just wanna see you happy,” Caroline said.
Ginny niggled her way between her sisters on the porch swing and gave it a gentle push to start a sway again. “I am happy, you goobs. I’m so happy and content and filled with joy in my life, with or without… youknowwho noticing me.”
“But he does notice you.” Georgia slipped her hand into Ginny’s.
“Maybe so, but no more meddlin’, okay? When Ryan finally admits how he feels… whatever his feelings really are, I want to know it was becausehefelt them and not that he was coerced into feeling some kinda way by his friends.” Ginny gave Georgia’s hand a squeeze. “But, I will admit, I am kind of lonely.”
She felt her sisters close in around her. Like they could protect her from any hard feelings with their mere presence at her side. And it made her feel stronger, sharing the load with them. “I’m not lonely in the way you think. I don’tneedwhat you guys have in Lake and Griffin, necessarily. Though I want it. And I want it with Ryan. I always have.”
Caroline cooed loudly, earning a playful elbow to her gut from Ginny.
“Of course I want it, but I just… more than that, I miss being with you all before the marriages and the babies and the moving. Bleh,” she groaned. “That makes me sound like such a whiny baby, but there it is. I’m alone a lot, ya know? Workin’ from home and being single, and I do miss Sadie and Dakota. I miss them so much. Sometimes, I see you guys living your lives with your families and, even though I’m so incredibly proud and happy for you, I’m not always sure where I fit in.”
She realized then how much her words sounded like Melody Man’s. His longing to be on the inside with his friends mirrored some of the same feelings she carried about her siblings. The love she had for them and the longing to be a part of it all. She smiled, despite it all, knowing there was a person in her life—though she’d never met him—who completely understood what she was going through.
“You’re our girl,” Georgia sighed, sandwiching Ginny into a hug between herself and Caroline. “I’m so sorry if you’ve felt like an outsider to our lives in any way. But you are cherished, Virginia.”
“You’re the best aunt and the best sister, Gin. But more than that, you are our friend. Our forever, precious friend. No season of life can change that.”
They both kissed her head and settled their temples on either side of her. “This growin’ up business is tough stuff,” Caroline said, admiring Simon in her arms.
Georgia giggled. “Didn’t I hear you tell Theo that, like, just before Ginny got here?”
“It's no less true for us than it is for him, Georgia Snow,” Caroline whispered, sounding an awful lot like their mama. “And Ryan? What are ya gonna do about him?”
Ginny shrugged. “I’ve been thinking about taking another wise woman’s advice.”
Georgia raised her hands in the air in praise. “Hallelujah!” she hollered, then lowered her voice. “That man could use a good kiss to knock him over.”
“We’ll see,” Ginny mused, and laid her head on Caroline’s shoulder and her hand in Georgia’s hand. “We will definitely see.”
They fell into a quiet calm, pushing their toes off from the floor and maintaining a steady rock on the swing. Ginny closed her eyes, listening to the sounds of the kids’ laughing on the lawnas they jumped into piles of leaves only to insist the men rake them up again, and the gentle whistle of the wind, brushing up against the remaining leaves on the trees surrounding the house.
“Y’all settled?” Ginny opened her eyes at the sound of Ryan’s voice, and found him casually leaning against the porch’s cedar post, one hand resting on the rail.
Leaning… she finally understood why Caroline had been so obsessed with theWhile You Were Sleepingreference during the months she’d tried to avoid loving Griffin. The way Ryan looked, so effortlessly cool and just… himself, with the colors of dusk settling in behind him and the light breeze ruffling his hair. She was completely gone for him.
“‘Course we are, Hood.” Caroline untangled herself from them and bobbed with the baby towards the front door. “I better get him down before dinner. I’ll see y’all inside.”
Georgia followed suit but hollered to the men and kids on the lawn, “Y’all come in and eat!”
