Page 13 of Until You

The kind of nice that makes a girl who grew up sleeping in six different beds before she turned twelve start thinking words like home and stay. And that’s the most dangerous thing of all.

My phone buzzes on the counter.

Jules

I hit the speaker and tuck it between my shoulder and ear while carrying my coffee toward the living room. The floorboards creak under my bare feet—the third one from the kitchen always groans a little, and I’ve gotten used to the sound, the way you get used to the particular voice of a place.

“Tell me you’re horizontal and eating crackers,” Jules says by way of greeting.

“I’m vertical and drinking coffee.”

“That baby is going to come out caffeinated and sarcastic.”

“Then they’ll have come to the right family.”

The word slips out before I can stop it.

Family.

It lands in the room like a stone dropped into still water. I feel the ripple of it in my chest—that quiet, aching thing I can never quite name. Want, maybe. Or the ghost of it.

I stare out the front window at the quiet street lined with pecan trees and neat yards. A mockingbird is going through its whole repertoire on the fence post, and somewhere down the block, a sprinkler is ticking in slow, lazy circles. This town looks like something someone painted from memory—soft-edged and too gentle to be entirely real.

Jules softens immediately. “You like it there.”

I blow across my coffee and watch the steam curl. “I like the room with its own bathroom and the fact that Pops thinks all vegetables can be improved with bacon.”

“That’s not what I asked.”

I hate when she knows me too well. When her voice goes quiet and certain like that, it’s like she’s holding a mirror up, and I can’t look away fast enough.

“It’s temporary,” I say. The word tastes stale in my mouth. I’ve said it so many times it should feel like armor by now, but lately it just feels like something I’m hiding behind.

“Mmm.”

“That was a judgmental mmm.”

“That was a best-friend-who-has-eyes mmm.”

I roll mine. “They’re nice to me, okay? They make me feel…”

I trail off. My throat tightens around whatever comes next. I press my thumbnail into the ceramic of my mug—hard—because the small bite of pressure keeps me from going soft in all the places I can’t afford to be soft.

“Wanted?” Jules supplies gently.

I swallow.

“Maybe.”

There’s a beat. The kind that holds more than words. Jules doesn’t fill it, and I love her for that. She knows there are rooms inside me I don’t open for anyone, and she just sits outside the door and waits.

“And have you thought any more about trying to find Cowboy?”

I snort. “Very funny. Let me just post flyers. Wanted: one devastatingly hot ranch man with commitment issues and strong thighs.”

“You forgot suspicious eyes and excellent oral skills.”

“Jules!”