Page 72 of Knowing Amelia

Amelia

“You were right.” Logan lifts his gaze from Amelia’s book.

My heart beats as if Amelia’s scene is playing out right before my eyes. And I’m shattered for her. I want to cry. Somehow, she ended up here, in Rendezvous, with Burt. And clearly, she never got over Seth. My childhood memories are a witness to that.

“Something awful must happen, and soon.” I give up on cooking and slump into a chair next to Logan.

“How do you know?” He glances down at the page he just read. The words Mrs. Seth Garrison outlined until they stand out on the page like bold letters.

“I know, because my dad was born only a year after all of this started. Which means she’ll be married to my grandpa soon.”

“Do you want me to go on?” He turns the page.

“No.” I shake my head. The whole thing has unsettled me. “Not tonight.” Her words, so full of life and hope, will change soon. I’m not ready. The grandma I knew never had that kind of light and joy in her life. She doesn’t end up with Seth. And while I always believed that she loved Grandpa Burt, she was still crying over Seth so many years later. She still loved him.

Logan stands, sauntering to the counter, and finishes chopping the onion I’d been working on.

I let him, swiping a hand over my face, batting away a sudden onset of tears before he can see me. I stuff down my emotion and meet him in the kitchen. Together we finish my stir-fry.

We work and talk, my mind still with Amelia when we sit to eat.

Logan reaches for my hand. “Are you okay? You’re quiet.”

I look up from the food I’ve picked at and offer a false smile. “I’m fine.” I stir the vegetables and rice in my bowl. But then, Logan isn’t Ben or even Dad. He’ll welcome my thoughts about Amelia. He may even help me understand them. “I’m just confused. She ended up so different than the girl from her journal. She was so unhappy.”

Logan’s brow creases. “Liv, she was happy. I don’t want to argue. And I’m not trying to make you feel badly, but I knew her”—he looks almost repentant with the words—“and well. She may not have been this spontaneous, energetic Amelia from her youth, but she was happy.”

I guess I’ll have to take his word for it. The truth is, he knew her better than I ever would.

His smile is tender. “Are you ready to forget your worries?”

Twenty-Seven

“You mean just switch up what I’m worried about, right? I’m not a singer. I don’t do karaoke. Not willingly. Not well.”

“You don’t have to be a singer. It’s karaoke, not American Idol.” His grin widens. “We don’t have to go at all, you know.” Logan isn’t about to bully me into anything—and strangely, that makes me want to go along with him all the more.

“I know.” I sigh. His dimple cannot be resisted. Mother Theresa would give in to Logan if he were smiling at her. “But we are.” I stand—and stomp. “Come on.”

He rubs his thumb back and forth over my hand, erupting a row of chill bumps on my arm. “You are a cute, silly girl.”

Silly? The word turns me into a child, a house-playing little girl. That’s not who I want to be as I sit next to this man who tugs at my heartstrings in a very real way. How have I fallen so fast and hard? All the while, he thinks of me as silly? Despite my plummeting heart, I conjure up a glare.

He smirks. Hmm… even my glares are silly. “What?”

But I’m not backing down. I just spent years in the wrong relationship. I may be completely smitten with the boy next door, but I won’t make the same mistake. “Silly girl? How many times are you going to call me that?”

Logan is unconcerned with my glare, with my lecturing tone. “How many more times do you plan to be silly?”

I’m not going to let that rugged grin distract me. Nope. He’s going to answer my question. “Do you really find me childish?” All of the magical ease and comfort Logan produces disappears. I’m antsy. I’m nerve-wracked. I’m questioning myself. And it’s a feeling I am all too familiar with. It’s— “Just like Benjamin.”

His face falls, and for the first time since I met Logan, he looks irritated with me. He releases his hold on my hand and steps away from the table. “Why would you do that?” His arms cross, his biceps flexing with the movement, distracting me for a second.

“What?” I ask, not at all innocent. I know what I’ve done. I’m even sorry about it. But I’m too frazzled to say so.

“Compare me to Benjamin.”

I deflate. “I didn’t mean it like that. I don’t compare you to Benjamin. I don’t think about Ben.” I had such high hopes for this first official date—more kissing, for one. Arguing with Logan was not on the menu. I shake my head. “I’m sorry. That word—silly. It makes me feel small. I don’t want you looking at me like I’m juvenile, like I can’t make my own choices.”