Hold on Tight (Sea Breeze #8)(42)

SIENNA

After I finished my burger, I excused myself and went to the safety of my bedroom while Micah took Dewayne to the living room to make him watch Return of the Jedi. It was a school night, and I knew Micah would end up falling asleep twenty minutes into the movie. He was like clockwork with his sleeping pattern. The kid required serious sleep.

I would need to be out of the bath and dressed when Dewayne left, so I could make sure Micah was tucked into bed. I sat down on the bed and reached for my phone. It was time I made a call.

I’d been putting off calling my aunt Cathy for two reasons. One, I wanted to see if she’d ever call me and check in on us. She hadn’t. Two, I was thankful for my aunt Cathy’s willingness to let me live in her house for so long, and I didn’t want to hear she’d had anything to do with the Falcos not getting my letters. But I honestly didn’t see any other explanation. I had resigned myself to the fact that my aunt Cathy had taken them.

I scrolled down the list of numbers in my phone until I found hers, and then I pressed send. When I had told Aunt Cathy I was moving, she hadn’t seemed to care either way. She was glad my mother had finally stepped up to help me, but that was about it. No warm hugs or any other emotions.

“Hello?” Aunt Cathy’s familiar voice came over the line.

“Hey, Aunt Cathy, it’s Sienna,” I said.

“Good to hear from you, Sienna. I take it life there is good?”

She was always so formal. Even with Micah she had been stern and strict. She didn’t do nonsense of any kind. She reminded me a lot of my dad.

“Yes, ma’am. It’s good here. Micah likes his new school, and I am doing well at my job. Micah, uh, met the Falcos. They didn’t know about him until they met him. Now they’re very active in his life.”

I stopped and waited for her to say something. She didn’t.

“I sent letters to them. So many letters. I wanted and needed them to know about Micah. Micah needed them. Tabby is the wonderful grandmother I knew she would be. Micah missed that for five years of his life. I don’t understand how this happened.”

Again I was met with silence. I started to say something else, but my aunt finally spoke up. “If you are calling me to ask me if I took those letters, this is a conversation you need to be having with your mother. I’ve done her job long enough, Sienna. I didn’t have children because I didn’t want the responsibility. Yet my younger sister neglected her responsibility to her own child, so I stepped in until you could stand on your own two feet. However, I’m not your mother. What happened with those letters is something I don’t have to answer for. You were staying in my house. I could do whatever I pleased. You need to call your mother and have a talk with her. It’s past time. Now, if that is all you’d like to talk about, I have some work to do.”

There was nothing else to say. Aunt Cathy had made it very clear. “No, ma’am, that’s it. I’ll let you get back to work,” I replied.

“You’re a smart girl, Sienna. Use that brain of yours and make a life that kid you were determined to have deserves. Let the past be the past.” And with that, Aunt Cathy hung up the phone.

I wasn’t surprised. Not really. She’d always been that way. Not once had she cooed over or cuddled Micah. She had treated us as if she was our warden, and now I realized that was really all she ever had been. But I’d been so desperate for someone to love us that I’d accepted whatever she was willing to give.

I looked out the window at the Falcos’ across the street. They loved us. More important, they loved Micah. Maybe it was time I called my mother. I had to forgive her and forget the past. If she wanted to see Micah, who was I to keep her from him? He loved having family. He deserved it.

A knock on the bedroom door stopped me from calling her. I put the phone down, walked over, and opened it up to Dewayne holding a sleeping Micah.

“You want to change him before you put him in bed?” he asked in a whisper.

I nodded. “Take him to his room and lay him on the bed. I’ll take it from there.”

Dewayne did as instructed. I followed him to Micah’s room, and then he stepped out while I took my time changing Micah into his pajamas. I kept waiting for the sound of the front door closing, but it wasn’t happening. Which meant Dewayne was waiting on me. When I couldn’t do anything else, I tucked Micah in and slipped quietly from his room.

Dewayne was standing in the living room with his arms crossed over his chest, staring at the pictures of Micah and me I had lining the mantel. One was from the day he learned to take his first steps. Another was from his third birthday. The last one was taken the day I graduated from beauty school.

“You were just a kid here,” he said, picking up the photo of me and Micah when he’d taken his first steps.

“I was almost eighteen,” I said. But I had been a kid.

“You look so proud of him. You don’t look tired or bitter. Just happy.”

“I was happy. My baby boy was walking, and I was the only person he would walk to. He was trying to follow me around the house. That’s how he started walking. Crawling wasn’t fast enough.”

Dewayne set it back down. “Do you have extras? I’d like photos of him and you. My mom and dad would too.”

I had taken so many photos and sent them with the missing letters. I’d also been keeping a scrapbook for my parents up until he was three and I realized they were never going to reach out and get to know Micah. So I’d stopped making it. But I still had it.