“True, but I would have learned for you.”
I tilt my head back to meet his gaze, a hand reaching up to pull his forehead to mine. My lips reach for his, and I kiss him softly. He keeps his forehead pressed to mine, the moment lasting so long I nearly doze off.
“Want me to stay over tonight?”
“No, that’s okay. I’ll be fine.” The words are out before I even register what he’s asking. It’s become robotic for me to say that I’m fine, even if I’m not.
He adjusts his hold on me, arms grazing up and down my spine. “Sometimes, you’re so busy from the moment you hear the news until the funeral is over. Your time is spent in a haze, making decisions, planning. You manage to stay so busy that it doesn’t fully hit you yet. Tomorrow might feel like day one, and if it does, I don’t want you to wake up on day one alone.”
I sit up, pulling out of his arms and curling my feet under me. “Thank you, but I’ll survive.”
A sad smile crosses his face, and he leans in to kiss his favorite freckle. “You’re the strongest woman—no, the strongestpersonI’ve ever met–I don’t deny that. I know you can do this on your own, but I wish you knew you don’t have to do this on your own anymore. I’m here. I’m just a phone call away, always. For whatever you and Jackson could ever need.”
Later that night, as he kisses me goodbye at the door, I watch the wrinkles in his shirt flex over his thick muscles as he walks down my front steps. And when he pulls out of the driveway, casually winking as he does, I realize that I’m 100%, without a doubt, in love with James Charlebois.
Chapter Twenty-Two
My eyes fixate on the ceiling fan, unwavering as the slow spin of the blades scatters shadows across the room. Even with the curtains drawn, the warmth from the day threatens to peek through the drapes. I don’t know where the sunlight gets the balls to shine today, how the earth still manages to spin and the fucking birds still want to chirp.
The world doesn’t seem to care that my chest is ripped in half, and there is this oozing, gaping hole I’m trying to cover up. I can’t hit a pause button and lay in bed under the covers until the weight is lifted, until I’m strong enough to get out of bed and face my new reality.
One without my sister.
Jackson’s giggle travels down the hall from the living room, his precious voice seeping through the closed door.
I always sleep with my bedroom door open in case he needs me. The rare morning that he somehow wakes up before me, I wake to the sound of his padded feet bounding down the hall as he runs and jumps, tumbling into bed with me.
But today, it sounds like he’s been up for hours, already past his groggy, refusing-to-talk phase and into his non-stop chatter phase. My parents mentioned they’d check on us today, andwhile I’m not in the mood to play host, I’m so thankful for someone else to be occupying him right now.
With a heavy groan I throw the blankets off and kick my feet out to sit on the edge of the bed. Squinting, I try to read the numbers on the clock through puffy eyes.
Crying with Jim must have opened some fucking secret dam, some wall of misery that I had been holding shut because once he left and I laid in bed, the tears wouldn’t stop. I cried for hours, muffling my pitiful wails with my pillow until sleep finally took me sometime around three in the morning.
I almost called him.
I wanted him to come and lay with me, to hold my back to his hard chest as I cried. I got as far as pulling his number up, thumb ready to press dial when I tossed the phone aside. I decided instead to dig around my dresser drawer to pull out his tee. The one I kept from that night all those months ago. His scent is long gone, but once the fabric laid over my skin I felt like he was there. It was enough for me to get a few hours of sleep.
The clammer of a dish shattering steals my attention, and I force myself the rest of the way up. I grab a bra from my dresser and slip it on so I don’t terrify my dad before going to my en suite and brushing my teeth. I turn the faucet on cold, letting the water pool in my hands and splashing my swollen face a few times before I dare to take a look at myself in the mirror.
If there was any question on whether or not I cried myself to sleep, the answer is written in my puffy, bloodshot eyes. If I had any tears left in my body, I’d probably break down at the sad sight in front of me.
I open the bathroom door and hear Jackson’s little voice echo down the hall, his bare feet padding after as he returns the broom to the closet.
“Momma!” he shouts, running to me and wrapping his arms around my legs. “I broke a plate, I’m sorry.”
I lean down to grasp him under the armpits, bringing him up for a full bear hug. “That’s okay, bud. Accidents happen, remember? Just as long as you didn’t get hurt.”
He squeezes me hard, and I bury my face into his neck, holding him for as long as he will let me. “That’s what Jim said, too,” he murmurs against my shoulder.
Jim.
He starts to wiggle out of my arms, and once his feet hit the floor he grabs my hand, dragging me into the kitchen.
“Come look! Jim’s making us pancakes!”
Jim glances over his shoulder at us from his spot in the kitchen, his hands busy whisking something in a bowl. He does a double take when he sees my face, shoulders slumping with sadness.
“Want coffee?” Jackson pipes up, dropping my hand to run over to the counter. He grips the ledge with both hands, pulling his weight up so he can reach the upper cabinet where I keep the mugs.
