Page 46 of Holding Hope

My voice cracked.

“To you, she’s a solution. A way out. But to her? You’re all she’s ever wanted.”

A watery laugh escaped me. “There hasn’t been a summer since we met where she wasn’t chasing after you. You were the sun to her, and the fact that you couldn’t care less⁠—”

“Don’t say that, Clarke,” he snapped, voice sharp and father-like.

“But you don’t!”

My voice rose. I was so close to understanding him—but his tone, his indifference, pushed me right back. “I don’t want to see Delia hurt. How is that wrong?”

Colton dragged a hand down his face. “I think I could—if we gave it time. If she gave me time, I could grow to love her.”

The urge to slap him again was almost overwhelming.

“So, you expect her to wait?” I asked. “Months? Years? Children? How is that fair to her?”

I grabbed his hand, pleading. “Why would you think I’d be okay with sending my best friend into something like that?”

I stood abruptly, rage burning through me. I couldn’t look at him anymore.

Without another word, I stalked to the door and flung it open.

If he wanted Delia, he’d have to convince her himself.

I would have no part in it.

A loud clatter followed by a string of PG-rated curse words jolted me out of my daze in the wicker chair on the Big House porch. Melody’s bathroom window was right behind me, so it took only seconds to get from the chair to the doorway.

I found her perched in an old chair, a pair of shears—as I was learning to call them—poised dangerously close to her eyebrows. She was seconds away from making the worst decision of her teenage life.

“Please don’t tell me you’re cutting bangs right now. You’re going to regret that in three days when the wind blows and they won’t stop flying up and exposing your massive forehead.”

Melody turned toward me, horror painted across her face, one hand slapping to her forehead. “You think my forehead is massive?”

Oh shit. Shit. Shit.

Stepping into the small room, I shook my head and gently took the shears from her other hand. “No, of course not. You have a perfectly normal-sized forehead. Me, on the other hand…”

She giggled as my voice trailed off. “I think I’ll just trim the ends instead. Bangs seem like a really long commitment.”

I snorted. She wasn’t the only one with commitment issues. “Well, if you’re going to do it, you might as well do it right.”

I set the shears on the counter and began sectioning her hair.

I wasn’t a cosmetologist, but I’d watched enough Brad Mondo videos to consider myself an at-home professional.

“I don’t want a lot cut off,” Melody said, adjusting her oxygen tank beside her. “Just enough to make Geneva Handersung shut up.”

In the short time I’d been here, I’d noticed how often her skin tone shifted—warm cream one moment, pale the next. No one had told me what illness she had, and it felt rude to pry.

I snipped the first section. Silky strands fell to the floor around my socked feet. “You shouldn’t let anyone named Handersung bully you about your hair. You have beautiful hair, Mels.”

“Geneva likes to say I won’t cut it because we never know when I might get sick again and have to cut it short.”

I whistled slowly. I wanted to tell Melody to tell Geneva to shove it, but I doubted Clarke would appreciate that kind of language around her sheltered little sister.

“If she makes comments like that about you, I can only imagine what she says about herself.”