Visiting with Hannah Clark hasn’t ever been on the list of things I want to be doing. She’s rude and selfish and as far as I’m concerned, some kind of dark sorcery witch.
I turn off my truck after finding a parking spot and head up to her apartment. The building is cold and smells almost like a hospital. My knuckles tap on the outside of her door a few times before I finally hear her flick the lock. When she opens the door,her arm has a bandage around her forearm, it looks like gauze as if she had it done at the emergency room or something.
When she sees it’s me, she quickly moves her arm behind her back, trying to hide what I’ve already seen. My eyes dart up to hers as she stands there. Tired, sad eyes stare back at me.
“Hannah, did something happen?” I ask, gesturing to her arm.
“I burned my arm taking pizza out of the oven.” I’ve been lying to people for the last few months. I know what a lie looks like. And Hannah Clark just lied to my face.
“Is my sister here?” She looks around me and her body language somehow tells me she hopes she is.
“Just me today.”
“Oh.” Her body sulks back slightly as we stand in the doorway.
In typical Hannah fashion, she doesn’t invite me in, doesn’t ask anything about how I’m doing or what I’m even doing standing at her apartment. She just stands there. Almost looking like a damn zombie. I’m actually surprised there isn’t any snarky comment coming out of her mouth.
“I wanted to talk to you. Mia doesn’t know I’m here.”
“Okay, talk then.” She waves her hand in the air at me.
“I will only make this offer one time, Hannah. And I’m making it because your sister is my best friend and I love her. She didn’t tell me much, but I know you’re in some shit right now. Mia offered for you to stay with her until you can get back on your feet, which if you ask me, is a really fucking generous offer and she didn’t have to do that. She’s worried about you. Even if she didn’t flat out tell me, I can see it on her, I can hear it in her voice. Your sister is a helper. It’s engrained in her human body to just fucking help people, even if it means hurting herself. I made a commitment to no longer sit back and let her sufferas she flails around trying to pour into everyone else’s cup while hers is bone dry.”
“What are you getting at, golden boy?” God, she’s infuriating.
“You can either take this check from me, catch yourself up on rent, utilities, whatever the hell you need… or you can call your sister, accept her offer and make amends with her. Get over whatever bullshit reason you have for disliking her and be a good sister. I hope you’ll choose the latter, because it’d mean a lot to her.” I sigh, realizing I have so much I want to say to Hannah as I stand here knowing everything I know. “You have no idea the things she’s had to endure, face, give up for you. She’ll never tell you about her hardships, because to Mia, she’s just doing what a big sister is supposed to do. She deserves for you to at least treat her with respect. You don’t want a relationship with her? It’s your fucking loss, Hannah. But have some goddamn respect for the woman who practically raised you.”
“Wow.” Hannah’s arms cross over her chest and I swear this might be the first time I’ve seen Wednesday Addams crack a smile.
“You like,love her, love her, don’t you?”
I pause before replying. Because, yes. I do. And I don’t know why it’s taken me so fucking long to show her.
“Yeah. I do. I’ve loved your sister for years. I was just a fucking idiot and I never showed it. No one ever shows it. No one ever thinks of Mia. We all like to believe she’s strong and tough because she carries all the burdens of everyone so well, and she is those things, but she also needs to know it’s okay to put it all down. She deserves to be shown love.”
Hannah’s head nods up and down and as expected she extends her hand and takes the check from my grasp.
“Thanks, Campbell.” She waves the check at me and closes the door.
“Did you sleep with the realtor of this place? She wouldn’t shut up about you. If you did, just tell me now so I can get ahead of it.” Bex says as she hands me the keys outside of the building I leased.
“I definitely did not sleep with her. She’s just an enthusiastic fan. Thanks for grabbing these.” I wiggle the key into the lock and open the door. I have a list of things I need to get done quickly.
“Meg will be here soon, she’s the interior designer you had me call.”
“Great, thank you so much. I’m going to do some demo today. I already asked about making some changes, the landlord didn’t care one way or another, so I’m taking out the desk here, and the bars along those mirrors. I’m keeping the mirrors on that whole wall, so we’ll need to gently take the bars down. Liam’s going to meet me here and help after practice.”
“Okay, I’m going to head back to the office. Check with Phil on that other property you mentioned in your email, I haven’t heard back from him yet.” Bex waves as she exits and I strip free from my flannel shirt and get to work hammering away at this old desk.
“Hey, I brought reinforcements,” Liam says as he walks in the door barely thirty minutes later with Abby following behind him.
“Reinforcements would have been Ford or Chase,” I joke, pulling Abby into a hug.
“Well, I have the Pinterest board you need, but I’m happy to leave and go back to myNew Girlre-watch, if you don’t want my help.” Her shoulders shrug and I just squeeze tighter.
“I’m kidding, please stay.” Batting my eyes at her, she pulls up her phone and starts scrolling.
“How was your trip?” Liam slings the sledge hammer and material goes flying.
