Page 100 of Seein’ Red

“Willa, just pop your head into⁠—”

The door opening cuts Gus short. As if we were marionettes on strings, I and all my siblings whip our heads around, watching our father walk in.

“Sorry I’m late, y’all. This young man showed up, wantin’ to talk, and it turns out, we had a lot to say to each other.”

Auggie moves out of the way, a content smile in place, making room for our unexpected visitor.

Nash.

My heart stops. My gasp catches in my throat, unable to escape, while my stomach does an acrobatic routine I haven’t felt since my pageant days. It takes a split second for everything to register. To make sure it’s all real.

Nash is here. At Hayes. Crashing Munch.

What. The. Fuck.

“Y’all,” he said, nodding at the group. “Sorry to interrupt your meeting. I know this time is sacred. But I was hoping I could borrow Willa for a moment.”

“Of course,” Auggie answers.

Except that’s not how this works. My father doesn’t get to offer me up like that.

“Nope,” I counter. I have to reach way down deep to find the strength not to run to him. Everything inside me is calling out to him, trying to pull him closer to me. Wanting nothing more than to get lost in his embrace. But I can’t allow that. I can’t let myself get hurt even more. “I have nothing to say to you.”

“Well, I have things I would like to say to you.”

“We did plenty of that yesterday.”

Nash purses his lips, nostrils flaring as he sucks in and then exhales a long, deep breath. “Yes, we did. But Willa, there were some things left unsaid.”

Damn it, he just won’t give up, will he?

“Whatever you have to say, you can say in front of them.”

I gesture to my brothers, all of whom don’t seem to have good enough sense to at least pretend to busy themselves with their food. Nope, every last one of them is hanging on every word coming out of our mouths like it was the Lord himself who burst in here with the next ten commandments.

“I love you, Willa.”

A fork clanks against the table, literally punctuating the statement with a bang. My pulse kick-starts, swarms of butterflies starting to fill my tummy. But I need to hold strong. Need to protect myself and the pieces that are left of my heart.

“I know you think I’m full of it, but I’m not,” Nash continues. “I really did mean everything I told you yesterday. I chose the wrong fucking time to tell you. I should have told you sooner. Like the minute you told me you thought you were pregnant.”

More silverware crashes onto the table, and this time I can feel extra eyes on me. Especially Gus’s. Guess that news didn’t make it as far as I thought.

“Or the day you won Miss Georgia. Or that night in the peach grove. Or a million and one other times when it would have been the perfect moment but I chickened out. I’m not chickening out now though.”

My chest tightens, my cheeks heating up. The temperature of the room just spiked a thousand degrees, and now it’s hard to breathe. No one else seems affected though. Including Nash.

“Willa, you are fiercer than anyone I’ve ever met. You could conquer the entire world if you wanted to, in heels, and still be home in time for dinner. And I know that with the fierceness comes walls that are higher than the Empire State Building and that you throw them up faster than snow would melt in Miami, but I don’t care. I will spend every day taking them down brick by brick if that's what it's going to take for you to understand that as far as I’m concerned, you’re it.”

You’re it…

“You are the perfect combination of can’t live without you and going to be the death of me. I love you. And I know deep down, you feel the same and are just too afraid to say it. Which is fine, because it’s fucking terrifying. But let’s be terrified together. You and me against the world.”

Tears burn my eyes, threatening to fall as I swallow. Hard. There is so much I want to say. Internally I’m screaming. A war is raging with all my wild emotions, and I’m unsure who will win.

So I go with the first thing that pops out.

“Get out.”