Page 39 of Micah
I don’t let go, content to stay in his arms while he carts me around. My self consciousness from earlier in the week is gone. Any worries about my weight, or Micah’s ability to carry me faded away. I smile over Micah’s shoulder, seeing Declan hunched over the short, perfect for me scooter, crab walking as he follows us.
Micah stops suddenly in the aisle, “The…fuck?”
I drop my cheek against Micah’s forehead, laughing, watching Colt and Jonas sword fight with giant crochet hooks. They’re not quiet about it, nearly knocking into a small elderly lady, who turns and beans Colt with her cane. “You ruffians. This is a place for civilized people. Smarten up! Put those away right now. Now,” she orders them. Wide eyed, they do as they’re told, then stand, awaiting judgment. “Well,” she sniffs, pointing at the top shelf with her cane, “make yourselves useful and get me three skeins of the cream wool.”
“Skeins?” Colt asks me, looking cowed.
“Three balls of the beige wool.” I clarify for him. He nods, pulling them down and carefully putting them in her cart.
“Good. Now I need some baby yarn. Come along, boys.” She toddles off, tapping the cart with her cane and eyeing Jonas, who just stands there.
Colt whisper yells, “Grab the cart Jonas,” as he meekly follows the crusty old woman.
“Do…should we…rescue them?” I ask, tears of laughter streaming down my face.
Declan snorts. “No fucking way. She’s scary as hell.”
And there it is.
As I relax in Micah’s arms, directing Declan to the yarns and hooks I need, the differences between these men, and all the men I’ve known in the past are glaring. No way would Brent, or my father, or any of the men from our church let a woman treat them like this. Or like that old woman did.
They seem almost…doting. Happy to help me, happy to be together.“You guys really don’t care what anyone thinks of you, do you?” I ask.
Micah chuckles. “Nope…except.”
“Except?” I ask, tilting my head. He smiles at me, then turns to Declan, raising a brow.
Declan explains.“We don’t care what anyone thinks about us, never really have, unless it serves us.”
“Serves you? How do you mean?”
“Well, sometimes it’s easier to let people think we’re dumb” he says nodding at Micah, “or snobs, or anything else we want them to think. We’ve gotten a lot of great intel over the years using that strategy. So we care what they think of us, because we want to make sure they’re getting the impression of us that we choose. Make sense?”
“I think we all do that to some extent.” I say, thinking of the masks I’ve worn over my life.
“Like?” Micah asks.
“Like playing the perfect wife, agreeing with everything Brent said, even when I thought he was wrong. It was safer for me to be what he wanted. It served me.”
“Exactly,” Declan says softly. “The only opinions that actually matter to us? Well, it’s the nine of us, and you and Becca. That’s it. Everyone else can go fuck themselves.”
I feel like I just grew an inch, at least. “Becca, I understand. She’s one of you. But me?”
“Holly,” Declan says with a wry smile, “we’ve all known Micah wanted you from the day he met you. You matter to him, so you matter to us.”
I’m going to tuck away the tornado of feelings that sends up at me, for now anyway.
I carefully avoid Micah’s eyes. “But, we’re not together. Until this week, we barely spoke.”
Declan slides his hands into the pocket of his black hoodie. “Doesn’t matter.”
“I don’t understand you guys. At all.” Shouldn’t they protect themselves more? Be more jaded or cynical? How can they just…draw me right into their fold?
Micah growls, moving towards Declan, swinging my legs up and placing me into Declan’s arms. I’m staring, wide eyed, up at Declan’s smiling face when Micah says my name, “Holly.” When he has my attention, he starts signs, “I told you I loved you. I meant it. This”he says, pointing between us “is not new for me. I didn’t think I was good enough for you, but I always wanted you. I didn’t try to hide it from my brothers. I made sure they knew, so they’d look after you.”
“Look after me?” I squeak.
“If anything ever happened and I couldn’t be there for you, I wanted to make sure you’d have someone.”
