Her brows pulled together.“That sounds fake.”
“It’s not. It’s right next to the French Quarter.”
Her eyes lit up.“So did you, like, grow up around jazz and voodoo?”
Valentina liked romanticizing things. Jazz and voodoo. If only my childhood had been half that interesting. More like crowded group homes and foster placements that shuffled like cards. There had been music, sure, drifting in from the street at night. But mostly, I remembered noise, chaos, and the feeling that the ground beneath me wasn’t solid enough to build anything lasting.
Still, watching her now, with her eyes wide and intrigued, I hesitated to disappoint her. She looked at my past and saw something fascinating. Something I’d never considered it could be.
“Mostly just loud.”
She didn’t seem deterred. “So no haunted cemeteries? No mysterious swamp rituals?”
“Sorry to disappoint. Just a lot of humidity and tourists.”
She leaned back, chewing the edge of her lip thoughtfully. “I still think it sounds magical. Like a movie.”
“Magical” was definitely not how I’d describe the Marigny. It was just another place I’d survived. But for a second—just a second—I tried to see it through her eyes. The jazz clubs, the street performers, the bright colors of shotgun houses crowded together, and the smell of café au lait drifting out from corner shops.
Maybe it was magical—at least the way she imagined it. Maybe everything looked better when you weren’t stuck in the middle of it.
She didn’t give me a chance to respond before she said, “You could show me one day.”
“You want me to show you?”
She nodded.“Isn’t where you come from important?”
Where I came from had never felt important—not to me or anyone else. Foster care wasn’t exactly a tourist attraction, and my childhood memories weren’t something I was eager to revisit. The Marigny was a place I’d survived, not somewhere I’d taken pride in. But she asked the question so simply, like it was obvious.
Like knowing these pieces of me mattered to her.
And somehow, maybe, that made them matter a little more to me too.
“I guess,” I said quietly. “Though you might be disappointed. It’s not exactly what you’re picturing. It’s not like where you came from. Not like your sister’s house.”
I knew what she must’ve been imagining. A family home filled with noise and laughter like the house her sister had. Oneof those places that made you feel welcome even if you didn’t belong.
My childhood had been nothing like that. It had been the opposite of stable, nothing close to welcoming. It was the kind of place people tried not to remember. Not exactly postcard material.
She tilted her head, regarding me carefully. “Well, no two places are the same, are they?”
“No,” I admitted slowly. “They’re definitely not.”
And for that, I was grateful. Her life hadn’t exactly been easy either, but at least she’d known what home could look like. At least she had memories worth holding onto.
I’d never envied anyone before—never had a reason to—but I found myself wishing, just for a second, I’d known a home worth missing. Somewhere solid enough that showing her wouldn’t feel like exposing a weakness.
“Can I ask another question?”
“Yes.”
“You won’t like it,” she warned.
“Ask me anyway.”
“Tommy said you were in the military.”
I nodded, seeing that she wanted me to confirm it. “I was.”
