Page 14 of Meant to be Mine

“Good day,” I said.

“Kensey,” Micah stated.

“What about her?”

“That’s why you’re in a good mood.” He said it with no doubts about his belief. “She showed up and now you’re a human being again.”

“I’m always a human being.”

“Debatable,” Cleo said. She set her glass down and looked at me. I knew that look. Our sister was inquisitive. Always with the questions. What are you feeling? How are you? Do you like her? “Drew, why have you never dated Kensey?”

I shrugged and shook my head. “Because she’s my best friend.”

“She’s also awesome,” Cleo said. “She’s smart and funny and she’s genuinely nice. She clearly thinks the world of you, which requires a certain kind of patience.”

“Thank you, Cleo,” I said. “Your personality is as sparkling as always.”

“I’m serious. Why not? She’s gorgeous. You guys get along so well. I always envied your relationship with her.” My sister met my gaze. “Why not give things with her a try?”

“Because I’m terrible at relationships. You know how I am. I get bored. I get restless. I’m good for about three months and then I’m looking for the exit. I’ve done it enough times to know it’s a pattern and not a coincidence.” I turned my beer in my hands. “I would rather keep her as my best friend for the rest of my life than spend three months trying to be someone’s boyfriend and then blow it up. It’s not worth the risk. And people always say they’ll still be friends, but they won’t. There’s always bitterness. I don’t want to change what we have.”

“Maybe it’s different with the right person,” Victoria said, looking at Callum. “This guy didn’t think he was good at relationships and I definitely didn’t want to be with some rich prick, but here I am.”

Callum laughed. “I don’t remember that line from our wedding vows.”

“I say it with love, obviously.” Victoria grinned and kissed him.

I spread my hands helplessly. “That’s a nice thought, but you and Callum got lucky. I’m not him, and Kensey is my friend. I’m not going to torch that. She’s too good for my bullshit. She deserves better than me.”

“Nobody’s telling you to torch anything,” Cleo said.

“That’s exactly what would happen.”

Micah shrugged. “Maybe none of your other relationships worked out because you already found the right girl.”

6

KENSEY

The garden had been my mother’s domain for as long as I could remember. Every spring, she’d spend entire weekends out here with her gloves and her kneeling pad. She spent more time talking to the plants and roses along the back fence than she did us. The herb section near the gate had a system. Everything had a system.

And now she was sitting in a lawn chair with a cast on her arm, watching me and my father attempt to execute that system from memory, and it was not going well. Her system wasn’t anything obvious and it wasn’t like she had written it down anywhere.

“The trowel,” she said. “Use the trowel, not the big shovel. Kensey, that’s too deep.”

“Mom, I barely broke the surface.”

“You’re going to damage the roots.”

I looked at my father, silently begging for help. He was crouched on the other side of the bed with a watering can, wearing the expression of a man who had survived thirty-five years of marriage by learning when to speak and when to just go with it. He caught my eye and gave me the smallest shrug.

“Neither of you are paying attention,” Mom said.

“We’re paying attention,” I muttered. I would never disrespect my mother, but I did have a very strong urge to throw a dirt clod at her.

“You can’t put those tomatoes too close together,” Mom said. “They’ll crowd each other and I won’t get any tomatoes. Separate them another two inches. Two not one.”

I took a deep breath, dug another hole, and looked back at her. “Better?”