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“I’m sorry kiddo. She had to go. Work stuff, you know. It’s a busy time of year.” The cracks in my heart bled wider at having to lie to him, but it was for the best. Sadly, Kane was getting older and didn’t look like he believed me all that much.
“Okay,” he said softly, his entire stance dropping. “Doesn’t matter.” He set the decoration down on the desk and walked away. I rose to follow, intent on comforting him but as soon as I did, he sprinted past Jax and vanished.
“Fuck.”
“I’ll see he’s okay,” Jax assured me, and he followed after Kane.
The handmade Batman decoration sat awkwardly on the desk, so I picked it up and then headed through to the lounge. The large tree was a pillar of lights and sparkles, a beacon of Christmas, and yet it brought me no joy as I crouched under the glitter and placed the decoration back on the tree.
Suddenly, a sharp clatter rang out from the kitchen, and I flinched, then headed over to see what was happening. I stopped in the doorway when I saw Summer; her hands were in her hair, and she was stomping her feet slightly, cursing under her breath as coffee beans spilled over the counter.
“Summer?”
She jumped and turned to me, eyes wide, and dropped her hands from her hair. “Sorry. I was just—I dropped the bag and the beans went… everywhere.”
Her voice was slightly strained, her posture stiff, and her eyes were wide and darting as if she couldn’t settle on where to look.
“That’s okay.” I gave her a soft smile and joined her by the counter. “These things happen. There’s plenty of beans; trust me I think Luke even hasbackupbeans just in case.”
My joke didn’t even grant a small smile from Summer, and I frowned lightly. As we started to gather up the beans, her hands were shaking, and she dropped the beans almost after she picked them up.
“Summer? Are you okay?”
“What? Yes, I’m fine,” she said quickly, turning her back to me as she poured beans back into the bag. “Why? Are you?”
“I’m okay,” I replied, moving past her to add more beans to the bag. “Are you sure? You seem um…”
“What? I seem what?” She looked up at me, and for a moment, it was as if she expected me to give her trouble or worse, similar to the look Kane gave me when I caught him awake past bedtime.
“Just… on edge. If there’s anything you need, to talk or a break or anything then you can let me know,” I offered.
“Oh.” Her head dipped, going back to scooping up spilled beans, and her hair fell forward, creating a soft curtain that I was struck with the urge to run my fingers through. I resisted. Something about her aura suggested touch would be a bad idea no matter how her presence calmed me.
“Do you ever feel like there’s some things you can’t escape, no matter how hard you try?” she asked suddenly.
My hands paused, cold coffee beans trailing from my fingers as Tiffany popped sharply into my mind. “All the time,” I sighed softly. “Why, has something happened?”
“Oh. No. I just… I’ve just been thinking. Sometimes it feels like things are firmly in the past, and then, y’know, they creep back up like they happened yesterday, and it feels like you haven’t moved on at all. Like all the changes are just fake, and you’re just pretending.” She lifted her head and glanced at me although she could not meet my eyes.
I deposited more beans in the bag and nodded. “I feel like that more days than I care to admit.”
“So, what do you do?”
“I…” I paused. I wanted to ask for details, to delve deeper into whatever thoughts were bothering her, but she was dancing around the point for a reason, and I respected her privacy enough to know that she wasn’t ready for me to press. “I guess… I try to think about how we all have a past that we’d rather forget. If you will, Jax has his bad-boy days where he cared more about alcohol and partying because that’s all he knew. Look at him now; he’s an amazing dad and he’s head of security at a billion-dollar company. I think about Luke and his accident and how he was rock bottom and clawed his way out.”
The last of the beans were scooped up by Summer, and she closed the drawstring on the sack.
“I think about myself and Tiffany. How I found out she cheated on me because Kane’s skin color differed from ours. I think about how I used to let her walk all over me because I was young and in love and was scared to be alone. I think about all of that, and then I compare it to what we all are now. Different people with different minds, different lives. Sure, sometimes the past doesn’t feel that far away at all but, Summer…”
I moved closer, and she finally lifted her gaze; a lingering sadness reflected back at me.
“Your past doesn’t define you. It doesn’t define any of us. What it does is show us how we’ve grown and moved past things we regret or are not proud of. That’s where our worth lies.”
She stared up at me momentarily, and then her gaze fell away. “Thanks. I—” For a second, it seemed like a confession lingered on her tongue, the real reason for asking, but the moment passed. “I’m going to take a shower before I get started on dinner.”
“Sure thing.” I watch her dip past me and vanish from the kitchen, leaving nothing but a deep yearning to comfort her filling the space in my chest. Despite everything else, one thing was becoming clear in my mind, fueled by the protective urge to follow Summer and try to keep her safe from whatever thoughts plagued her.
Love was growing for Summer in my heart, and I had no intentions of fighting it. I just had to ensure no one’s past, including mine, got in the way.
