“You’re always welcome here, Lucy,” Mary said, kissing her cheek.
“I’ll go put Talon in her car seat,” Lucy said to me, taking Talon from my arms before thanking everyone once more.
Mary gave me a tight smile and pulled me into a hug. “I like her,” she whispered as she patted me on the back. “She has a good heart.”
She wasn’t wrong.
Once she went back inside, Professor Oliver stood on the front porch, grinning wide.
“What?” I asked, my eyebrows knotted.
“Oh, Mr. Russell,” he sang, placing his hands in his pockets, rocking back and forth.
“What?!”
He whistled low, shaking his head back and forth. “It’s just funny that it’s happening to you of all people, and you seem one hundred percent ignorant to it.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I guess it’s harder to see the plot line when you’re the one living the story.”
“Did someone forget to take their crazy pills again?” I asked.
“In every story, there’s the moment when the characters go from act one, the old world, into act two, the new world. You know this.”
“Yes…but what does that have to do with anything?”
Professor Oliver nodded toward Lucy. “It has everything to do with everything.”
Realization set in and I cleared my throat, standing up straighter. “No, that’s ridiculous. She’s just helping with Talon.”
“Mhmm,” he said, almost mockingly.
“No, really—and, regardless of your batty mind games, she’s Jane’s sister.”
“Mhmm,” he replied, driving me crazy. “The thing is, the heart never listens to the brain’s logic, Mr. Russell.” He nudged me in the side with an all-knowing hitch in his voice. “It just feels.”
“You’re really starting to annoy me.”
He laughed and nodded. “It’s just funny, isn’t it? How the main characters never know about the adventures they’re about to go on.”
What bothered me the most about his words was how much truth was contained in them. I knew my feelings for Lucy were growing, and I knew how dangerous it was to allow myself to develop any kind of emotions toward her.
I couldn’t remember the last time I felt the way I did when I held her hand, or when I saw her caring for Talon, or even when I saw her merely existing.
“What do you think of her, Graham?” Professor Oliver asked.
“What do I think of Lucille?”
“Yes. Maybe if you can’t be with her, perhaps you still have room for a friendship.”
“She’s my complete opposite,” I told him. “Lucille is such an odd character, a freak of nature. She’s clumsy and always speaks out of turn. Her hair’s always wild, and her laughter is at times annoying and too loud. Everything about her is disastrous. She’s nothing more than a mess.”
“And yet?” he urged me on.
And yet, I wanted to be just like her. I wanted to be an odd character, a freak of nature. I wanted to stumble and laugh out loud. I wanted to find her beautiful disaster and mix it together with my own mess. I wanted the freedom she swam in, and her fearlessness of living in the moment.
I wanted to know what it meant to be a part of her world.