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“No,” I say.
“Wolfe looks almost exactly like his father did at that age. It’s uncanny.”
“You and Galen?”
“We were young, and he was unlike anyone I’d ever met before. We had a strict rule that we never practiced magic together—that was a line I could never cross—but there were other lines I was more than happy to cross with him.” Her voice sounds far away, almost happy.
I shake my head, not quite believing what she’s telling me. “But how did you even know him?”
“When your grandmother became ill, she began to include me in all her duties, preparing me to take over her role. And those duties involved occasional meetings with the old coven. Galen started attending with his mother, and, well, things progressed.” She speaks of him with regard even now, and I struggle to fit this new information into the version of my mother that I know.
“You loved Galen Hawthorne?”
“It was a long time ago,” she says, waving her hand through the air as if clearing the memory. “I loved Galen for all thethings he wasn’t. I knew we didn’t have a future together, and so did he, but for one winter we pretended we had all the time in the world.”
“And you both accepted that?”
“It wasn’t something we had to work to accept. We were just two kids having fun before we inherited our responsibilities. There was never a question about where our loyalties lay.”
“You never wondered what a life with him might be like?”
“No,” she says, giving me a sad smile. “Thisis the life I believe in. This is the life I want.”
“Would you still want this life, want the new order and low magic, if the mainland wasn’t watching? If it wasn’t dangerous to do high magic?”
She doesn’t answer right away, looking off into a faraway place I can’t see. I hold my breath and wait for her to show even the slightest sign of doubt, but she never does. “Yes. I don’t love the new order only because it gave us our lives back; I love it because it fulfills me in a way nothing else ever has. I love this island and this magic and delighting tourists. I would choose it over and over again, regardless of what was happening across the Passage.”
The answer guts me because I can never live up to that. I wish I believed in anything as much as my mother believes in the new order.
You did.
The thought pops into my head unbidden, but it isn’t real, isn’t something I can grab hold of. I was told that I once believed in something with everything I am, but without the memories, it’s just dust on the road.
“Do you ever think about him?” I ask, needing to change the subject.
“Galen? More, recently,” she says, eyeing me. “But not often, no. Your father asked me out not long after Galen and I ended things, and I knew from our first date that he was it for me.”
“How did you know?”
Her face softens, the way it always does when we talk about Dad.
“I could be myself with him,” she says simply. “We believed in the same things, and I didn’t have to put on a show or try to be someone I’m not. He accepted me fully, exactly as I am.”
“Thank you for telling me that,” I say.
My mother smiles and squeezes my arm. “You’re welcome. Now, why don’t we get Ivy over here and practice your hair and makeup?”
She walks to the phone, and my mind continues to work through our conversation. I’m glad we talked about everything, so glad I finally know the truth, but it doesn’t settle me as much as I wish it would. My mother has made choices I know I could never make, and while she told me about Galen to showcase our similarities, it only serves to highlight our differences.
Because apparently, I couldn’t accept that my time with Wolfe was limited.
I couldn’t accept that his world, his magic, wasn’t an option for me. I couldn’t accept thathewasn’t an option for me.
And even though Landon doesn’t want me to have to try with him, I do. But I didn’t with Wolfe. He told me I did things I know I would never do unless I was fully and truly myself.
My heart races and my palms sweat as I replay my mother’s words.
By her standards, Wolfe should be the absolute love of my life.
