“Then I want to keep doing it. I want to keep helping you be creative. I
want you to keep succeeding. I want to keep learning about who you are
and all the things you love. I don’t care who you were before. If I did, it
would just be to marvel at how far you’ve walked down a road that wasn’t
easy. I was walking my own road, but now those roads are going to be
going parallel, I hope.”
“You don’t have to hope. You can know. The things in my life didn’t
change me. I wanted to change myself. Even before my dad and all of that,
in college, and after, I tried to be different. Truly me. I guess like everyone
else, I seriously needed to figure out who that was and who I wanted it to
be.”
“I know.” June’s smile was potent like sunshine. The rays of it were truly
lifegiving. “I don’t want to scare you or anything, but over the past few
weeks, I keep having this thought. About you being such a good fit. No,
that sounds horrible. I mean, it feels like you’re my one. I should have just
said that, but then I panicked and thought that maybe it was way too soon
and so I—”
“That’s funny,” Arabella whispered, leaning into June. “Because I keep
having the same thought.”
“Do you?”
“I do.”
“Does it scare you?”
“It’s terrifying.”
June’s throat worked hard. “Okay, good. Because I feel the same way.
About the terror. And the wonder. And the goodness. And the rightness.”
“That sounds like the perfect ad for a new shoe line. Something a little bit
edgy, but also awesome.”
June laughed. “This might be the one time I don’t want to talk about
shoes.”
“Oh really?” Arabella purposely pushed her eyebrows up as she cast her