Lahat ng Kabanata ng My Boyfriend's Dad?: Kabanata 71 - Kabanata 78

LauraJanuary was quiet.Not the cold, cruel quiet of the year before. A different kind. The kind that comes after a storm. After the wind has died and the rain has stopped and you are left standing in the wet grass, looking at the sky, waiting for the sun.Damon was different.Not in a big way. Not in a way anyone else would notice. But I noticed. The way he breathed. The way he stood. The way he looked at the oak tree in the morning like it was saying something to him.He had put the box on the shelf. The memoir. Matthew's letter. The lollipop in its frame. All of it. On one shelf. In the study. Where he could see it every day.I asked him why."Because I am done hiding," he said."From what.""From myself."That was the most honest thing he had ever said.---School started again.My junior year. Second semester. I was twenty now. Twenty years old. That felt impossible. I had spent my entire teenage years falling in love and breaking hearts and putting them back together.Megan sat

LauraI pick him up at the airport on a Friday.The sky is that particular shade of grey that isn't quite rain and isn't quite sun. The kind of grey that means maybe. Maybe it will clear. Maybe it will pour. Maybe both. The kind of grey that doesn't commit to anything.I stand at the arrivals gate with my hands in my pockets.Damon is in the car. He said he would wait. He said Rick might need space. He said it in that careful way he has now. The way that means he has thought about every possible outcome and is trying to prepare for all of them.I told him to stop thinking so much.He said that was like telling the rain to stop falling.I said the rain has a purpose.He said exactly.I did not have a response to that. So I kissed him and got out of the car and walked to the gate and now I am standing here with my hands in my pockets and my heart in my throat.---The doors open.People come out.Families. Businessmen. A woman carrying a baby and a diaper bag and a look of exhaustion th

LauraThe thing about August is that it tricks you.July is honest. July is hot and loud and demanding. July does not pretend to be anything other than what it is. But August is different. August is the month that pretends summer will last forever. August is the month that gives you warm nights and golden light and the kind of air that feels like a hug. August is the month that lies.Because September is coming.September is always coming.And September means change.---I feel it in my bones.The shift. The turning. The way the light changes from gold to amber to something softer. The way the mornings get cooler. The way the roses start to look tired, like they have been blooming for so long they forgot how to stop.I am twenty years old.Twenty is not old. Twenty is young. Twenty is supposed to be about possibilities and futures and the kind of decisions that feel huge in the moment and meaningless in hindsight.But twenty is also the age when you realize that time does not wait.Ti

LauraNovember is the month of holding on.The roses are gone. All of them. The red and pink and white and yellow. The ones Rick planted. The ones Damon and I planted together. The ones that bloomed all summer like they were trying to prove something. Gone. Just stems now. Just thorns. Just the memory of color.The oak tree holds on.It always holds on longer than the others. Longer than the maples. Longer than the birches. Longer than the roses. The oak tree stands in the center of the garden with its leaves turned brown and gold and copper, rattling in the wind like a warning.Winter is coming.Not metaphorically. Literally. The cold is coming. The dark is coming. The days are getting shorter and the nights are getting longer and the world is getting ready to sleep.I am not ready to sleep.I am not ready for the dark.But the dark is coming anyway.That is the thing about November.It does not ask for permission.---Damon notices.He notices everything now. Not in the way he used