“You didn’t answer,” she sing-songs her words.
“I was,” I grunt.
“I like her. The way she dances,” the sigh that comes out of my daughter is one I recognize because of the hints of wonder in the sound, “is beautiful. She glides across the floor like she understands what it means to be a shooting star.”
I suck in a sharp breath and blink quickly because there is no way I’m going to allow myself to cry right now. Not right now.
“She does,” I whisper.
“I saw the way you looked at her.” The words are soft and without any artifice.
Which is why they give me pause. I pull off the road into the parking lot in front of a business I barely look at. My eyes are fixed on my daughter, the person who has been the center of my world from the moment I held her in my arms. I owed it to her and had no reason to give her any less.
My voice is rough as I ask, “How did I look at her?”
“Like you understand what it means to be a shooting star just because you’re close to her,” her words are cautious like she’s not sure if she should have seen so much.
Everything in me relaxes because I realize what needs to happen here. I have to just keep doing what I’ve been doing all her life—be honest.
“I have never loved anyone other than Brielle Fowler,” my words are slow at first, but I can feel them building up speedalong with the rising tide of memories I’ve spent years keeping at a distance for my own self-preservation. “She was always luminous, like a star. I would watch her dance for hours and every time she would spin, I could see the joy on her face. It was always the emotion for her, the way movement can express a story that is understood, no matter who is in the audience.”
“What do you mean no matter who is in the audience?” Rian’s eyebrows are pulled together, and curiosity is written all over her face.
“Brielle believed, probably still does,” I chuckle, “that it didn’t matter who was in the audience. She said the movement bridged the gap between the stage and those witnessing the steps and who they are—their age, race, gender, social status or any other marker people use to label each other—didn’t matter because the movement could reach them.”
“You loved her,” she studies my face carefully, her voice stronger now, surer.
“I did.” I blow out a breath and rub a hand over my face. “I don’t think I ever stopped.”
“Now she’s here,” she points out far too gently for a girl her age. “You aren’t going to let her get away again, are you?”
My eyes narrow as I look at my daughter. “You wouldn’t mind?”
She grins from ear to ear and shakes her head slowly. “No.”
Her face scrunches up in a way that has me bracing; it’s the face she makes whenever she’s about to lay her young wisdom on me with a simplicity which tends to knock me on my ass.
“Seems to me that even though she’s not the mother that gave birth to me, she’s the mom I was meant to have.” I blinkand swallow hard. Could it be that simple? Vulnerability fills her voice, “It might sound silly, but I love her.”
“Oh, sweetheart,” I reach for her and pull her against my chest as much as I can. She takes the comfort easily and leans into me. “I don’t think it sounds silly at all.”
“You don’t?” Her voice is muffled against my chest.
When I chuckle, she pulls back and rubs her nose, but her eyes, the same ones I have, search my face. “No,” I assure her, “I don’t. Knowing Brielle, I think it’s just our lot in life with her being her and us being a Connors.”
Something serious crosses her face. “What happened?”
“Life,” I tell her honestly. “She needed to go and make her dreams come true. It wasn’t going to happen in Seneca Falls. Hell,” I grunt, “it wasn’t guaranteed anywhere; far from it.” I look out beyond Rian and remember the way it felt to be around Brielle back then. “Being with her was like catching a firefly in a jar. You desperately want to keep it, but you know the only way it can really live is to let it go.”
“Or it could die,” she whispers.
Because we’ve chased fireflies at Sagebrush. Just like I used to with Brielle.
“Yeah,” I breathe out. I don’t even realize I’m rubbing my chest over where my heart is beating out a reminder of what it felt like to know I was leaving my heart behind when we walked away from each other. “I had to let her go and it didn’t feel like I could follow her. I needed to figure out what I wanted and where I belonged. Seneca Falls felt like home in a lot of ways, but I still felt the need to go, to seek somewhere else.”
“And that’s how you found the club,” she says it with a decisive nod. It’s not the first time she’s heard that part of the story.
And more than one version considering my mom’s love of nostalgia and our family’s history is unparalleled.