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She greets me as I emerge from the restaurant with a big smile and reaches for my hand, “Look,” she says, pointing toward the enclosure, where Pippa Jane is now leading Christian’s de-scented skunk, Bella, around the area in what looks like a game of follow-the-leader. “She made a friend.”
“Well, of course, she did,” I say, squeezing Macy’s hand. “She’s a sweetheart. And a natural leader.”
Macy laughs. “She is. But she would kill me if I tried to put a pink ribbon around her neck like Bella’s.” She makes a soft cooing sound. “But oh, it’s so cute. Don’t you think Pip would look adorbs in a big fluffy ribbon?”
“Adorbs,” I agree, making Macy snort. “But not pink. I think blue is her color.”
“Or yellow,” Macy says, cocking her head. “Maybe yellow and blue stripes?”
“Perfect. I’ll start looking for one online as soon as I get a new phone.”
We settle on a bench and Macy leans her head on my shoulder, “Sorry about your phone. I can buy you a new one. Since it was my fault that you were out in the flood in the first place.”
“You’ll do no such thing,” I say, wrapping my hand around her thigh just above her knee. “I’ll take care of it on Monday. And maybe look into what they have available for mobile hotspots, since I’ll need reliable internet while we’re on the road.”
“I can help with that,” she says. “I’ve had one for years, but let’s not pull the trigger on anything yet. We should do some planning and talking first, see how we really want the next few years to play out.”
“Sounds good,” I say, not worried about that conversation at all.
As long as we’re together, I don’t have many other preferences. Though I would like to avoid taking an RV anywhere near the Artic Circle. I’ve watched too many vampire movies set up there and have a real aversion to freezing to death.
As far as whatever other adventures Macy has in mind, however, I say, bring it on, though I’m sure some of my family members will think I’m crazy. They’re already giving my cousin Matty shit for wanting to live in a van while he drives through Mexico into Central America, and he’s always been a less traditional person than yours truly.
But that’s fine. I can handle my family’s game of twenty questions. I feel like I can handle anything right now.
I’m so busy basking in the happy glow of being close to Macy again—and out of danger—and watching the animals play, that I don’t see the pickup truck pull up.
I do, however, immediately sense Macy tense beside me.
I shift my attention her way to see her usually pink cheeks have gone white and follow her gaze to the faded blue Ford maneuvering into the last parking spot in the gravel lot. The driver moves slowly, cautiously, in tiny fits and starts that give me anxiety even before I see the head of curly salt-and-pepper hair visible through the back glass.
Macy’s mom isn’t an attractive woman—she frowns too much for that—but she has a pretty amazing head of hair. When we were younger, Macy bemoaned getting her dad’s straight, glossy brown locks instead of her mother’s curls.
I don’t know how she feels about that now, but one look at her face makes it clear she and her mother are probably on even worse terms than they were when she left.
I turn on the bench and murmur beneath my breath, “You want me to cover you while you go hide in the bathroom? Maybe they’ll leave once they realize there’s a waiting list.”
Macy shakes her head slightly, her haunted gaze still fixed on the Ford as the engine shuts off. “No, it’s okay. If I’m going to stay in Bad Dog, this has to happen sooner or later. Might as well get it out of the way now.”
I frown, but before I can ask what she means about staying in Bad Dog—surely it won’t take more than a month or two to get ready to leave, and we can avoid her parents until then, if she wants to—she’s on her feet, crossing to meet the couple mincing their way across the gravel lot like they’re traversing a field of ice. Everything about Macy’s parents screams “the world is a scary place and we’re mad and sad about it.” The way they drive, the way they move, the way their eyes narrow in suspicion for a beat at the girl approaching them before they realize who she is, and their suspicion is replaced by a different kind of fear.
Fear of their own daughter…
It breaks my heart nearly as much as the fact that they didn’t seem to recognize her at first. Time hasn’t touched Macy. Aside from slightly longer hair and the hint of smile lines at the edges of her eyes, she looks the same as she did before, just…happier.
Or, at least, she did look happier.
Until she started talking to those two.
I have no idea what words they exchange at first, but by the time I get to Macy’s side to offer moral support, her dad is saying, “Well, that’s good you got out. But you shouldn’t have been at that cabin in the first place. Ain’t safe for a girl alone.”
“I’ve spent most of my adult life traveling alone, Dad, I can handle it,” Macy says, contradicting him with as much kindness as someone possibly could.
But her father clearly doesn’t like it. His gaze hardens and his expression becomes even more guarded than it was before. “Well, that’s your choice, I guess. Nothing I can do about it.”
“Nothing we could say, either,” her mom pipes up, the words pinched from her tightly pursed lips. “Never would listen. Not even when you were a little girl. Always had to go your own way, even when it led to nothing but trouble and sin.”
“I wasn’t sinning at Uncle Clint’s cabin, Mom,” Macy says, tightness creeping into her tone. “I was just hanging out with my pet pig in front of the fire and hoping the storm would pass. And then Theo came to try to save us, like the amazing person he is.”
