I had been drawn here. I had been, godsdammit.
And I wanted to be here for the rest of the messy, unsure people who might eventually come here too.
My hand flexed in front of me with the ferocity of the words, my breathing heavy. I expected the same hatred back threefold. Instead, I received worse, and I was willing to take it all.
“I tried to be nothing but a mother to you since it was clear you didn’t have one.”
“I do!” I screamed at her. I screamed at the woman I’d wanted to scream and scream at from nearly the day I’d met her with her appraising looks and words of advice I hadn’t asked for. “I have a mother. She was the most beautiful and wild woman I’d ever met—that anyone had ever met. She died, not that you ever cared to ask because you never got to know me beyond what I was worth to you. But I have a mother.”
Celeste stared at me, stunned to silence.
“She sure isn’t you,” I said. “So, stop lying and trying to act like you want what is best for me under some sort of guise to get ahead with your own real children. I’m sorry that I, the girl who came from nowhere, found something worthwhile here. Love and family and this feeling that I finally belong when all you’ve ever wanted from me was to leave and be unworthy.”
Of Barnett. Of Ryan.
Gods, what had I done to Ryan? To myself?
“That isn’t—”
“It doesn’t matter. Love …” I nearly laughed now at the word. “Didn’t you once say that was the purest form of magic we could make? Is that what this all looks like to you?”
It looked like I wasn’t the only one who still had a whole lot to learn in this life.
But I was the one who decided to never stop.
Standing still on the front steps of the house, for a moment, I thought it was my chance to turn and head back inside even if she followed me. I didn’t have to resort to it though, like a child running away.
Celeste nodded once, twice, three times in understanding before she met my eyes—both pairs lined with tears—and then she turned away down the path and toward the beat-up hatchback.
When she got inside and drove away, I finally saw the other person in on our conversation, standing across the street. With fluffy hair at the top of his head, he stood there. He looked just like how I’d left him the other night. His eyes looked so bright and clear, even from this distance.
Pressure built in my throat, pulsing with the tears behind my eyes. I wouldn’t let him see me cry. I had promised the other night that I wouldn’t let Ryan see me cry.
Especially not when his lips parted in despair at what he must’ve seen transpire.
I wanted to rush across the street. I really did. I wanted to feel his arms back around me again. But they hung limply at his sides.
Who am I?
Because maybe I was evolving and this was my next greatnext.But maybe I wasn’t the pretty, extraordinary person I’d imagined. Maybe I was still just me, a little bright and shiny, sure, but also a little ugly inside.
“Hi,” I gasped, though I wasn’t sure if it was loud enough to reach him.
His hand rose, however, just a little. “Hey.”
“I’m not able to talk to you. Not right now.”
“Okay. I’ll be here.”
I nodded over and over again as I turned around, heading back inside the house before the tracks of tears fell. So, alone, I gasped for air around all the terrible words I’d said today, constricting my throat and lungs. I wanted him so much, and yet this was not how I wanted me. It was not how I wanted him to want me when he deserved so much better. So, maybe Celeste was right; I couldn’t have him.
I pressed the mounds of my hands into my eyes, trying to make myself stop. I should’ve been all out of tears, but not yet.
Not today, not today, not today.
Slowly, a presence knelt in front of me and carefully peeled away my palms from my eyes. I had done this for her before, more than once before. I thought we both realized that as she tipped her head in understanding.
Ana’s mouth screwed to the side as she looked me over. “I think we need a little me time, huh?”
