“Maybe you have forgotten that there was once a Power who fell from grace; he was the Chief Power in fact. His name was Lucifer. Do not become too comfortable in the belief of your own strength or level of restraint. To become too sure of one’s self often leads to pride which in turn leads to one’s downfall.”
“I know Zacharias. As I said, my mission in all of this is only to keep a promise that I made...nothing more." Something in Micah's chest tightened as he remembered the promise he had made long ago. His only intentions from the beginning had been to keep that promise. But somewhere along the way he'd began to feel things.
Now he wondered, at what cost would keeping that promise come to Emma, and to himself?
Micah didn’t come to Emma the night of prom and she worried about the possible reasons why. It wasn’t fair if he was punishing her for how the date had ended, she was doing a good enough job of that herself. She needed his comfort, and his advice. Where was he?
She'd really made a mess of things this time. Micah probably wasn't going to be too understanding. Her temper had taken over.
"Micah?" she whispered again.
Still no response. Surely he could hear her. He must be beyond angry to stay away like this. She'd have to find a way to fix it.
Chapter 11: RUMORS
The next morning before church, Emma got up extra early. She hadn't gotten much sleep but she couldn’t take her own worrying anymore. She'd been staring at the ceiling most of the night and she desperately needed a change of scenery and some fresh air. She got dressed, pulled on a jacket and headed out the door before anyone else was up.
She started walking not at all sure where she was going. It felt good just to be moving. The crunching of the gravel road under her feet was a comforting sound. The birds were singing, and the sun was peeking up over the eastern mountains. Emma took a deep breath of crisp mountain air and let it out in a long sigh.
Life was still moving forward so there was still a chance to fix all the things she'd messed up last night. She stopped under a lone cottonwood tree that lined the road and leaned against an old weathered cedar pole fence that surrounded the adjacent field.
“Where are you going Emma?” Micah’s voice startled her. She hadn’t been expecting him to show up after so obviously avoiding her the night before.
“I’m just walking,” she said with a little gall in her words.
“Hmmm,” he said casually.
“Where were you last night?” Emma asked in monotone.
“I had things to see to,” he said calmly. “I didn’t think you’d mind a little privacy, you had quite a night after all.”
“Yeah, I thought it was probably something like that.” Emma was purposely being rude to him. He'd known she needed to talk to him, but he still hadn't come.
“What do you mean,” he asked. “Are you angry with me?”
“I’m a little angry,” she admitted. “If you knew that I had quite a night, then you should have also known that I would have wanted to talk to you about it.”
“I’m sorry that you’re upset Emma,” he said softly, “but I really did think it was best for you to have a little time to think about things without me clouding your judgment.”
“I don’t know what you mean Micah.” Emma was frustrated that he'd said he was doing what was best for her. It made him sound like a parent and her like a child, but she wasn’t really in the mood to go into that at the moment.
“I just think that it's probably harder for you to really think things through when I’m there taking up your time and attention.”
“And what was I supposed to be thinking through, exactly?”
“How the evening had gone, of course,” he laughed lightly. "You had just attended prom and it was technically your first date ever. That deserves a little after thought don't you think?"
“And am I right in assuming that you already know how it went,” Emma said glumly.
“I got the just of it Emma. I wanted to ask you about that. I really don’t understand why you are making it so difficult for the McQuade boy,” his voice sounded almost stern. Emma didn’t like it.
“What would you have had me do differently,” she huffed, “just let him have his way with me?” Her voice was getting louder; it carried across the empty field.
“He wasn’t trying to have his way with you Emma. Don’t you think you're over-reacting just a little,” Micah's voice was firm, but he kept it low and controlled.
Emma folded her arms stubbornly, and stared down at the ground. Why was he saying these things? He was supposed to be her guardian, supposed to defend her. It seemed like he was more concerned with Destry’s welfare than hers.
“I just don’t think that you gave him a fair chance,” Micah said after Emma didn’t reply.
“A fair chance to do what, kiss me?” she spat defiantly.
“That’s not what I’m saying. You should give him a chance to get to know you. You should also give yourself a chance to get to know him before you just push him out of your life altogether.”
“I don’t see why it matters so much to you,” Emma smirked. “I’m free to choose, right? If I don’t choose Destry, that’s my choice. It doesn’t really affect you.”
She could feel the teary buildup at the edge of her eyes. She wasn’t about to start crying now. She turned and started walking swiftly down the road toward home, letting the breeze dry her eyes.
“It matters to me Emma, and it matters to you too, whether you want to admit it or not,” he said from behind her. Emma didn’t respond she just kept walking.
In retrospect, it was easy to see everything she'd done wrong. But she was already beating herself up enough over it; she didn’t need Micah’s help with that. She knew he was right though, and of course that irked her even more.
She shouldn't have overreacted the way she did. Poor Destry would probably never recover. But then again, Emma wondered if she mattered enough to him to even deserve a second thought.
He had gone to all the trouble of asking her to prom. But Emma still wasn’t sure why he'd chosen her. Maybe she'd seemed like a challenge to him. She wasn’t always falling all over him like the other girls at school.
She had done her best to ignore him since that first incident because she'd thought him rude. She knew deep down that wasn't the only reason she'd been avoiding him. Part of it was that she knew she didn’t stand a chance with him and had been avoiding the inevitable brush off.
It had been easy for Emma to ignore him before. She'd been so focused on Micah that she didn’t see anyone else. It was as if she had become blinded to the rest of the world after Micah had entered hers.
Emma finally convinced herself that Destry had only asked her because he was being nice. That conclusion made it easier for her to live with the guilt she felt for how she’d treated him. He must have considered her a social outcast and wanted to do a charitable act by asking her to a dance. He seemed like the charitable sort.
Why else would he have waited until the week before prom, unless he was just making sure that no one else was going to have enough pity on her to ask her out?
Emma didn’t need his pity or anyone else's, she still had Micah—even if he was being difficult at the moment—and he was all she needed.
“You haven’t said nothin' about last night. Did you have a fun time with that feller that took you to the prom?" Gram asked after dinner.
She probably wondered why Emma hadn’t been gushing over her date like any other normal teenage girl would have been. When Destry had asked her to prom, Catherine and Gram had both assumed that Destry was the one who'd been occupying her thoughts for the past few months; that he was the object of her day-dreaming episodes, the one behind her unexplainable happiness.
“Yeah,” Emma tried to put as much enthusiasm into her answer as possible.
"Your mom said he was quite a looker," Gram prodded.
"He's pretty cute I g
uess,” Emma offered.
“That’s all you’re gonna tell me?” She prompted, a disappointed look spreading across her face.
“What exactly is it that you’d like to hear?” Emma asked, too much edge to her voice.
She really didn’t want to think about prom or Destry. The date had been perfect right up until the end. And that bad ending was all on her. It was for the best. She didn’t want to give Destry any false hopes. That was just a one-time thing with him.
“Any little tidbit of information would be helpful. You haven’t told me anything at all,” Gram said with fake disappointment. “I need something juicy to gossip about with those ornery old heifers in town.”
“That’s not a very nice way to talk about your friends Gram,” Emma hoped to change the subject, but Gram had no intention of dropping it.
“If you don’t tell me, I’ll just make something up,” she pushed.
Emma wasn’t about to let that happen. Gram had no couth whatsoever about anything. She’d have Emma in all kinds of trouble if left to her own devices. She was good at making up gossip that could ruin anyone’s good reputation almost instantly.
This town was so small that Emma knew anything she told Gram would be passed through the whole population within a day. She didn’t want anything bad to make it back to Destry. She decided she’d have to be very careful in what she told Gram, giving only the basic, mundane details.
“Okay,” Emma finally agreed.
She sat up in her seat and leaned in towards Gram, trying to make it look like she was giving her something good.
“I had a lot of fun. We even kind of matched in our style of clothing, which was weird, but it made me feel less like a dork. He danced with me almost every dance. He was very polite, and he even let me wear his coat on the way home because it was so cold. The decorations were awesome; the place looked like a fairytale. Luckily I made it through the whole night without spilling anything on me, or him. So all-in-all, I would call it a success.”
Emma sat back and smiled brightly at Gram. There, that wasn’t so hard, she thought, nothing incriminating or even gossip worthy.
Gram snorted. “That’s your story and you’re stickin’ to it huh?” Emma could tell that Gram did not approve of this soft-core version she'd just been served. “I guess if that’s all you’re gonna give me, I’ll have to come up with some fillers when I tell it," she raised her eyebrow impishly, "you know…make it a little more interesting.”
“Fine!” Emma conceded. “He is really handsome; cute doesn’t even begin to cover it. And I like how his eyes sparkle when he smiles. He told me that I was stunning, which no one has ever told me before, and so of course I was a little embarrassed but also flattered. At the end of the night, he was going to try to kiss me, but I wasn’t having it. You should have seen the shocked look on his face when I told him he was “a pushy boy” and left him sittin’ in the driveway with his mouth hangin’ open.” Emma stopped abruptly.
She'd said too much in her effort to give Gram just enough information. Gram’s eyes were wide, and an evil grin was spreading across her face.
“You’d better not breathe a word of this to my mother,” Emma threatened. Catherine would not be pleased with Emma’s melodramatics in the least. It was bad enough having to deal with Gram, but Emma knew that her mom wouldn’t let her little tirade slide as easily.
“I won't tattle on ya',” Gram swore solemnly. “You really put him in his place, did ya?” Gram enjoyed that. She admired strong women.
Emma didn’t deserve Gram’s admiration. She didn’t want anyone being proud of her; she still felt horrible about how she'd behaved. There was no excuse for her treating Destry that way.
“I feel kinda bad about it now," Emma admitted. "I think I might have been a little too hard on him.”
“Nothin’ to feel bad about,” Gram reassured her. “If a girl don’t want to be kissed then she shouldn’t have to just stand there and take it. That boy sounds like a bit of a scoundrel if you ask me,” Gram stated, folding her arms across her chest.
“No he’s not!” Emma demanded. “He was a perfect gentleman, I was the scoundrel.”
Destry had been very good to her. He didn’t deserve to be thought of as the villain.
Emma hoped that someday he’d find a girl who would know just how lucky she was to have someone like him. A little part of her wished that she could be that lucky girl, but she quickly pushed that thought back down into her deepest place. It didn’t really matter how much Destry resembled the Prince Charming that Emma had been waiting for, he was too late—she wanted more than the fairytale now.
“He must be something special if you’re willing to defend him like that,” Gram snickered.
“He is special,” Emma admitted reluctantly, “so don’t you go around blackening his name Gram. Swear you won’t!”
“Alright, alright, I promise I won’t tell nobody nothin’ about none of this,” she crossed her heart with her pointer finger. Emma still wasn’t sure she intended to keep that promise. Gram had said it using double negatives, maybe in an attempt to throw Emma off.
“Swear you won’t tell somebody something either,” Emma teased, throwing Gram’s bad grammar back at her.
“Whatever you say smarty-pants,” Gram chortled.
Emma’s mom stepped around the corner and glared at the two of them suspiciously. “What are you two arguing about in here?” she insisted.
“We ain’t arguing,” Gram assured her, “we were just havin’ a normal conversation—that is, until you butted your nose into it.”
Catherine rolled her eyes. She didn’t want to make Gram any more cantankerous than usual by pushing the subject so she retreated back to the kitchen. Gram gave Emma a wink and she knew Gram wouldn’t betray her trust.
Emma had to admit, it felt good to finally be able to talk to someone about her embarrassing display. Gram didn’t think that she was too terrible of a person, so maybe the damage wasn’t as bad as Emma thought.
She hoped she hadn’t damaged Destry’s pride too deeply. She wasn’t about to take it back though. She was going to stay away from him as much as possible. She didn’t want him getting his nerve back up again, just in case she was more than the charity case she'd thought herself to be.
Emma knew she was in danger of liking Destry and she wouldn’t allow that to happen.
There was something about spending any more time with him that worried her. If she got too close, how hard would it be to pull away later?
Eventually Micah would come around, right? And when that happened, Emma didn’t want to feel obligated in any way to Destry. She knew she would never be able to explain her angelic love to him and she didn’t have any desire to try.
What if Micah didn’t come around though, could never love her like she thought she loved him? Should she really give up a good thing like Destry that was tangible and right in front of her, for something so unsure and invisible?
Emma knew she shouldn't waste too much time worrying about that. After her little tantrum Destry was sure to avoid her now anyway. She couldn’t really blame him. Destry had probably realized by now that she was a freak and not worth his time.
Unfortunately, Micah had been right in what he’d said to her that morning— it did matter to her. And whether Destry hated her or not, the implications of it all were making Emma dizzy.
Chapter 12: COMPLICATIONS
Emma had avoided Destry all week. He'd tried to approach her several times, but each time she'd pretended not to see him and walked quickly in the other direction.
She felt bad about the way she'd left things. He probably thought she was ignoring him because of his conduct on prom night. That wasn’t the case of course. Destry hadn’t done anything wrong. He’d been a perfect gentleman.
Emma felt absolutely horrible each time she caught Destry looking at her from a distance with confused and apologetic eyes. Why did he care so much that she was ignoring him?
She’
d been counting on him to react the opposite way and avoid her like the plague, but apparently he wasn't holding anything against her.
Emma’s high school days were becoming more and more complicated. She longed for the escape of summer vacation when she wouldn’t have to hurt this innocent boy any longer by so obviously avoiding him.
Home life had become complicated as well. It wasn’t easy to keep dodging the bullet that was her mother. Catherine was growing suspicious about the whole prom night story. She was constantly asking why Emma hadn’t gone out on anymore dates with Destry. She didn’t understand why he never called or came over if they had really hit it off as well as Emma had said.
If that wasn't enough to make her insane, Micah seemed to be more and more withdrawn lately. She couldn’t put her finger on it, but something was definitely off with him. Emma knew he wasn’t happy about her behavior towards Destry. She was afraid he would discover her reasoning behind it involved forbidden feelings she held for him.
To say that things were complicated was putting it mildly. Something needed to be done. It was time to set things right with Destry and let him down easy.
But first she intended to find out what it was that was eating at Micah.
After school Emma drove up into the foothills. The sun shone brightly through the powdery white clouds that floated in the light blue sky. It was warm enough today that Emma didn’t need a jacket, a perfect day for being outdoors. This is where she went when she wanted to be alone with Micah.
She spread her old quilt out on the soft, green grass and laid back and closed her eyes letting the sun warm her skin. The breeze stirred the aspen leaves to life and they trembled and swayed in a happy little dance.
Emma felt Micah’s presence as it surrounded her.
“I’m glad you came,” she smiled without opening her eyes—what would be the point when there was nothing to see?
“I knew you wanted me to come,” he stated flatly, “you’ve thought of nothing else all day.”
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