Heat Wave(119)

“Who are you talking to?” I hear her voice boom from inside the house.

Logan squeezes my hand tighter and shoots me a hopeful smile. He’s got me. We’ve got this.

When my mother sees us, she gasps loudly, hand at her mouth, then her chest. Talk about a pearl-clutcher.

“What the hell is he doing here?” she says, looking between the two of us. Her lip curls up with disgust when she notices our hands entwined with one another.

“Mrs. Locke,” Logan says. “Always a pleasure to see you.”

Her eyes narrow, her cheeks turning red. My mother is a beautiful woman for her age, but it’s moments like this that make her ugly as sin. Her true self can’t help but show.

“Are you here to make a fool of me?” she sneers. “Is that what this is?”

“No one is making a fool of anyone,” Logan says. “We came to tell you…”

“That I’m leaving,” I speak up, finding my voice. I clear the uncertainty from it. “We’ve decided to be together. To get married. We’re heading back to Kauai tomorrow, staying in a hotel tonight. I just wanted to say goodbye.”

She’s speechless. My father tries to put his hand on her shoulder but she shrugs him off. “This is all your fault,” she says to him, her tone pure acid and vinegar.

My dad takes his hand away but doesn’t back down. “I did what was right. We had no business in that hotel, Rose, and you know it. It was to help Juliet and Logan. Juliet’s gone. Our interests are too.”

I’m glad my father is speaking up. He’s going to pay for it later, but since it seems like he’s already paying for it, I have faith this might make him stronger in the end.

But it’s none of my business. I can only worry about me and Logan, just as they will only worry about themselves.

“I know you don’t want Logan and I together, I know you think this will create a scandal, make people talk. But let them talk. Let them think what they want. I’m sorry if you have to suffer in any way but I’m not going to give up the love of my life over that. And if you can’t be happy for me, if you can’t see my heart and see the good this man brings me, then I’m sorry. But I choose him. I choose love. And I choose this life, the one I’m leaving for.”

For a moment I think I see softness in her eyes, maybe a glimmer of understanding, maybe I’ve let her feel, for one moment, what it’s like to be me, what I truly deserve. But then it’s gone. Her gaze hardens, her posture stiffens. Whatever empathy, sympathy, she might have felt is buried deep down. I’m not sure she’ll ever see this for what it is.

But that’s on her now. I’ve done my part.

“I love Veronica,” Logan says, his voice low and strong. “And you can choose not to believe it. But she believes it. And so do I. We’ll be out of your hair now and you know you can always reach out to us and we’ll be there for you. As a family. But you aren’t family unless you want to be and that means accepting all that we are. In Hawaiian you would be ohana. And it will always be an option.”

My mother stares at us with all her fury, and I can see how ruined she is by all of this. That she thinks that I am choosing Logan over her, just as Juliet chose Logan over her. She hates to lose, even though she thinks what she’s losing is replaceable.

It’s not.

I’m not replaceable. And maybe one day, one day, she’ll recognize this.

But I’m not holding out hope.

I have Logan.

I have my hope already.

“Get out,” my mother says, her voice low, close to breaking. “Get out and never come back.”

Don’t cry, I tell myself.

And I don’t.

I look over her shoulder at my father and give him a nod.

“I love you, dad.” I look at my mother, who can’t even look me in the eye now. She’s staring at the ground, her jaw grinding. “I love you, mom. That will never change, even if we do.”

I swear my dad is shedding a tear. I can’t stare at him for too long either or I’ll break down. I turn around, Logan putting his arm around my waist and leading me down the stairs.

“If you ever need us, you’re always welcome in paradise,” Logan says over his shoulder.

The door slams behind us. I don’t look back.

We go through the gate and I feel like I’m in a daze. I’m not happy, I’m not smug or vindicated. I’m not destroyed either. I’m just…sad.

Sad that it had to be this way.

Sad that I couldn’t have the family I wanted.

But then I remember I have a family back at Moonwater.

And I have Logan.

And now we’re free.