That made more sense. “Thank you,” I reached up and kissed his cheek, “so much.”
“You're more than welcome Harper.” He roughly whispered. After a few minutes of us silently holding each other, his phone rang. “What's up? Yeah, we'll be there in an hour. Alright. Bye.”
“Jeremy?” I guessed.
“Yeah, he said Mom’s afraid we aren’t going to show. So are you ready?”
I nodded but inside I was shaking my head furiously.
We said bye to the family and headed over to his mom's house, stopping to get some Golden Spoon for the four of us on the way since I'd been having ridiculous cravings for anything sweet lately, and secretly thought I needed to come with some form of a peace offering. I was shaking by the time we pulled up in front of the gorgeous house overlooking the beach, I hadn't even been this nervous when I first met her. Brandon was carrying the Golden Spoon bag full of frozen yogurt and toppings and I seriously considered ripping it out of his hands so I could use it as some sort of shield, but the door was already opening.
“Hi sweetie!” His mom smiled and pulled me into a warm hug. Guess the shield hadn't been necessary.
“Hey Mrs. Taylor.”
Brandon chuckled softly and attempted to turn it into a cough, I guess he could hear the quiver in my voice.
“Oh come on now, you know you can call me Carrie.”
That offer still stood? Good to know. I smiled and tried to sound normal this time, “How've you been? I love your new place, I'm so glad you decided to move here!”
“Us too! We needed a change and I love this side of the family.” She gasped and her fingers flew to her mouth and then fluttered to my stomach, “Oh, look how big your belly is! How far along are you now?”
My jaw dropped, “Uh, thirty weeks.” Did she think it was Brandon's baby or something? She was acting just the same as at Christmas.
“You're so close! Are you ready for him to finally be here?”
She even knew it was a boy? I shot a questioning look to Brandon but he was getting everything out of the bags and putting it on the counter. “Yes and no. I want to hold him and see him, but I think I'll miss this.” I said pointing to where he was currently sleeping.
“That's exactly how I felt with both of them, I think that's normal.” She rubbed her hand over it once more and turned to Brandon, “You got frozen yogurt! Oh my God it's like you read my mind! I've been craving it all day.”
Apparently I'd been stressing out over nothing. This had definitely not gone as I'd feared. Brandon handed me my bowl and said he was going to check on Jeremy. Carrie sat down next to me at the table and gave my hand a quick squeeze.
“I've missed you girl! How are things? How are you doing after what happened to Chase? I was so sorry to hear about that.”
“I'm okay, so is his family. We're just trying to move on, but it was really hard at first.”
Her mouth tilted up in a sympathetic smile, “I know how hard that can be. Brandon was so worried about you, but you're strong, I knew you would make it through this.”
“Um, Carrie? About Brandon.” I gulped down an imaginary lump in my throat, “Why are you being so nice to me? I thought you would hate me.”
She seemed to think about her next words for a minute, her smile now warm and her eyes bright, “Honestly, I was really hurt for my son when he told us what happened, but even then, I couldn't hate you. You'd made a mistake, and you were trying to deal with the consequences.” Carrie glanced over her shoulder to where Brandon had left a few minutes ago, “One way or another, you and Brandon will always be in each other’s lives. The way he looks at you is the same way Liam looked at me for fifteen years. You still look at my son that same way, even after all that has happened. How could I ever hate someone who loves my son and holds his heart?”
“But we aren't together.” I whispered, it almost sounded like a question.
“Maybe it'll stay that way,” she shrugged, “and maybe it won't.”
I should have told her that we had to remain just friends, so she wouldn't continue to think that someday he and I might be together again, but I couldn't bring myself to say it.
“And don't think I didn't notice that you didn't deny being in love with him.” She winked and took a big bite.
Crap.
Brandon came back a few minutes later, Jeremy rushed up to pull me in for a long hug, and the four of us hung out until later that night when my eyes started to get heavy. We said our goodbyes and hugged, Carrie made me promise to come around more often, and I was more than happy to agree. She was too bubbly and fun to not want to be around. The next thing I knew, my heavy eyelids slowly opened when Brandon lowered me to my bed.
“I'm sorry,” I whispered, my voice raspy from the short nap, “I didn't mean to fall asleep.”
He smiled and tucked a loose chunk of hair behind my ear, “Don't worry about it, you were tired.”