Melia-Irrevocable Journey (Sequel to Irrevocable Quest)

015:

015:

It was Mother's Day still. Melia had walked the short distance back to the cottage, feeling grounded and just slightly headachy. Her mother had been right, she needed to ground out all the way, rather than dealing with this, but what would do it? She couldn't keep a permanent set of people around that could ground her. She had to get on with life. It seemed to be getting worse not better.

She got into the cottage and put Hannah in her crib where she arched and stretched and then slipped back into that languid baby unconsciousness, and Melia thought she might go wash the dishes. There were a few. When her cell buzzed.

She looked at the number on the screen, as was habit with just about everyone she knew that owned cell phones and her brows knit in consternation. A name was there, so somebody she had in her data base.

Ryan.

A name she hadn't seen in almost a year.

She held the phone out as it buzzed. Answer it, she commanded herself, but something held her back. She stared at it in shock.

Ryan.

Now.

She clicked on and held it to her ear. No one was there, that blank sound of no connection. She hit the send button and it started to ring again. He picked it up quickly.

"Did you call me?" Melia asked quickly, not being able to think of anything else to say, her heart was beating a mile a minute. She made it to her own bed and sat down on the dark purple coverlet, smoothing it automatically, as if touching reality for a moment.

"Hi. Yeah, I called you. I wanted to... to wish you a happy Mother's Day."

Melia let out her held breath. She didn't know what to think. He was a missionary. He shouldn't be calling her. "Shouldn't you be calling your mother?" Her voice wasn't snide, it was just a comment.

"I called her already today." He said, "But I've talked to her more recently anyway."

Because of Jared, she thought vaguely, closing her eyes and willing herself not to build at all. She had to remain calm.

"How are you doing, Mia?" His voice was familiar, but the face she saw when she thought of him was red and angry. What was going on here?

"I'm okay." She managed to say, not knowing what else to say. "How are you?"

There was a hesitation. "Dealing, I guess. It hasn't been easy."

Well, no, it wasn't easy. She didn't know what to say to that either. She didn't know how to comfort him, or if she even wanted to. It was his one singular event, his reaction to their marriage that had sent him flying into a rage and her to feeling confusion and unhappiness whenever she thought of him.

"Are you.... Dealing okay?" He finally asked her awkwardly.

"I don't like to talk about it." She answered honestly, no façade there, she thought. I don't like to talk about it.

"I guess that would be natural." He said and there was another long awkward pause. "H-how's the baby? It's a girl, right?"

"Her name is Hannah." She said tightly, not sure she even wanted to share Jared's daughter with Ryan after the way he'd treated them.

"Oh." He said. "So, is that a family name on your side? I guess I don't know any Hannah's."

"Om, no." She managed, letting out that held breath, her heart thundering away uncomfortably. "It's after Hannah in the Bible."