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“Micah, that isn’t true exactly, but . . . Separately, aside from anything with Shane and me, why did you tell him? After I promised I wouldn’t. I don’t understand.”

Micah’s eyebrows drew together, his blue eyes a maze of emotions. The kind so complicated she wasn’t sure she’d ever fully be able to untangle them.

“You know what, never mind. Maybe this is a conversation we have with Dr. Grove later, but—”

“Mom. I was scared.”

“Scared of what?”

“When I was with Shane . . . he was always like . . . Dr. Grove keeps telling me I can have my feelings on the inside, but when they turn into outside actions, I need to say them to you.”

He sounded so adult, talking about a therapist’s coping mechanisms, and yet he was still such aboy.Her little boy working through this horrible thing.

“So, the thing was, being with Shane . . . He’s like a real dad. Like my friends’ dads. He says no and gives advice and stuff. And I wanted . . . I just wanted him to be my dad, but he’s not. And I just felt sick all the time.”

Micah clutched his blanket, looking down at it, and Cora understood, maybe a little too well, what he meant. That horrible feeling that all this good would come to an end. With Shane, she’d let some of that go—before the broken arm fiasco—but Micah wasn’t at that point yet.

“Sick that I wanted him to be that, that he couldn’t be. I wanted to stop feeling that way so I . . . I thought I’d ruin it. I’d tell him, and, well, I knew he wouldn’t boot us out, but I figured you’d stop being with him, and it’d all go back to being the way it was before. But it’s not. It’s worse.”

“Baby.” She said it on a gasp, but she wasn’t sure Micah paid her any mind. He was babbling ahead, and she was still reeling.

Like a dad.

“But we can make it better. Shane, he knew, and he never acted different. He even said I’d have to do some sucking up to you before I get back on a horse. And that I’d learned my lesson. He didn’t . . . Nothing was different. So, it can be okay.” Micah looked up at her hopefully.

Why did she have to keep disappointing her baby? “Micah, it isn’t so simple. Because relationships, when you’re an adult, it’s all different. It’s hard, and it’s complicated. It’s even hard and complicated to explain, let alone deal with.”

“But you said you loved him, and he loved you, and he didn’t treat us differently. He didn’t. . . . Brandon and Will and Sam . . . I . . .” Micah ducked his head. “I love them and all, but they don’t slap me on the back or push me as a joke. They don’t grab me or anything. And even after I’d told Shane, right after I told him, and we were at the game and they hit that home run and he kind of picked me up and shook me around. It didn’t change. You know?”

Cora nodded, because she didn’t trust her voice enough to speak. Although nodding was making the tears in her eyes perilously close to falling. Yes, the boys at Mile Highwerecareful with Micah. No roughhousing. She thought it was more forhersake than Micah’s, but she understood what he meant about the difference.

He got to bephysicalat the Tyler ranch. A boy. And it hadn’t changed even after Micah had told.

It hadn’t changed.

“Mom, we can fix it.”

We. She would fix anything for Micah, but this wasn’t about her son. It was about her. “I’m so glad things didn’t change for you and Shane. I want you to be able to look up to him and spend time with him. What’s happened with him and me is different, separate. It’s about me.”

“But he loves you. Like Uncle Brandon loves Aunt Lilly, and Sam loves Hayley, and Will and Tori. They’re all getting married. Sometimes they fight, but you’re always saying people in love fight because that means it matters.”

“Micah—”

“Mom . . .” He reached across the couch with his good arm, grabbing onto her hand. “Mom, are you scared? Like me. Because it was good, and I was . . . Sometimes when everything’s going well, I think Dad’ll show up. Like basketball camp. Then I just want to ruin everything, and Dr. Grove said to talk before I act. If you’re scared, you’re supposed to talk before you act. I messed it up, I did it backwards, but you’re an adult and stuff. You can do it the right way.”

She wanted to refute it. The kid wastwelve. How would he know what it felt like to be seen this way? She wasn’t afraid of good. She’d been all settled into it. Happy and ready for a future until those flashing red and white lights.

And, oh, hadn’t she jumped onto that as asignawfully quick? Hadn’t shejumpedat the chance to make Shane the bad guy. To cut him off before he could prove to her things could still be good.

But he’d known. All that night before he’d known, and he’d loved her, and Micah was right. Shane hadn’t treated her any differently. Not like she’d break or like he needed to second-guess how she felt or what she wanted.

But that had been short. So quick. How could she trust it?

“Dr. Grove says it’s okay to be scared.”

“I thought you didn’t listen to her at all, and now you’re spouting everything she’s ever said?”

Micah smiled sheepishly. “She’s okay.”