The Long and Winding Road (The Seafare Chronicles 4)

“It’s your room.”

“In your house.”

“In our house,” I correct her. “And this is your room. So whatever you say goes.”

She narrows her eyes.

“Within reason,” I add hastily.

“Dammit,” she mutters.

“Um. Don’t curse. And other parentisms.”

She sighs, long and loud.

“Wow, you’ve got that teenage-angst thing down pat. Good job.”

“Sit down if you’re going to.”

I do, making sure to sit as close to her as I can without touching. She’s a little weird about touching. She gets uncomfortable if people hang on to her and doesn’t like to be hugged unless she’s the one initiating it. Her therapist gave us some medical blah, blah, blah about it, but Izzie said that’s just who she is, so we took her at her word. She’s getting better at it, but we still respect the boundaries she sets. It’s only fair to her.

“This is your house too,” I say. “And even if you don’t believe that right now, it won’t change anything. You’ll get there.”

“It’s called the Green Monstrosity. It’s the color of nightmares. Maybe I don’t want it to be my house.”

I shrug. “So we’ll move.”

She looks up at me, startled. “What?”

“If you don’t want this to be your house, we’ll move.”

“You would do that,” she says, sounding shocked. “For me.”

“Otter and I both would. Because you’re with us, Izzie. For good. And if this doesn’t feel like home, we’ll find a place for you that does. It may need to wait a little while, until after the twins come, but we’d do it. And if you didn’t want to stay here during that time, that’s okay too.

Dom and Ty would—”

Her eyes are wide when she says, “No, I don’t want to go with them. I want to stay here. I was just kidding. I don’t want to leave. Please don’t. Please just let me stay here. I don’t want to leave you and Otter. You need my help, right? With the babies? I’ll do a good job. I promise. You don’t need to worry about me. I’ll stay quiet and won’t complain about anything and I—”

“Izzie.”

She looks stricken.

“I need you to listen to me, okay? Can you do that?”

She nods, but she won’t look up at me.

“No one, and I mean no one, will ever make you leave. I want you here. Otter wants you here. I promise, okay? If you want to stay here in the Green Monstrosity, then you can do just that. This is our home, and that means you. And we’re going to need so much help. In case you haven’t noticed, Otter and I really don’t know what we’re doing.”

“You guys are kind of pathetic,” she says, sniffling as she wipes her eyes. “I think you’d be lost without me.”

“Probably,” I agree. “And I need you to hear me on one more thing, okay?”

“I know what you’re going to say. I know he didn’t mean it.”

“Do you?”

She shrugs.