Congratulations. We are pleased to offer you admission to the University of Georgia…
My knees buckled. I reread it twice, three times, the words blurring until they finally stuck.
“I got in,” I whispered. Then louder: “I got in!” I screeched for joy and danced a weird little jig. The neighbor’s hound exploded into frantic barking across the road, and I laughed so hard I almost fell in the ditch. I tore up the porch steps, flung open the door, and nearly collided with my mom, who had come halfway down the hall at the noise.
“I got in!” I shout, waving the letter. “Mom, I got into UGA!”
Her face crumpled and she dropped the towel she was holding, pulling me into her arms, and for the first time in years, I let her. “Oh, baby. I’m so proud of you.”
I swallowed hard. I hadn’t heard that the day I told her what he did. But maybe we were both learning. Because after everything…her distance when I needed her most, the silence after the assault, all the ways she didn’t show up, I needed to hear that more than anything. Getting into UGA wasn’t the bravest thing I’d ever done. But maybe she was trying. Maybe we both were.
It wasn’t a long moment. Her phone rang in the kitchen and she hurried off towards it. But it was enough. A stitch in a seam that had been frayed for years.
I tucked the letter to my chest, my whole body vibrating. I couldn’t sit still. I needed to tell someone else—someone who wouldget it.
I fired off a text to Maria who confirmed she was still at the clubhouse, and so was Hannah.
Hannah Mills had shown up with casseroles and baby ointment and, somehow, with steel-backed belief inme. She’d taken me seriously when I said “shelter,” when everyone else just smiled politely. She’d told me to start now. And now—I had a brick. A foundation.
The clubhouse was five minutes away. My legs felt like springs as I grabbed Sally’s keys and ran out the door. She roared to life, and I flew down the back road, heart hammering in time with the engine. For once, I wasn’t the screw-up. I wasn’t the broken girl with sharp edges. I was a young woman with a future.
I don’t think my feet even touched the ground as I sprinted up the clubhouse steps. The letter crinkled in my fist, and Sally still ticked hot in the lot, but I didn’t care—I had news. The kind of news that made my chest feel too small for my ribs.
I shoved the door open and practically shouted it at the room. “I got in!” Heads turned. Conversations stopped. For one awful second, I wondered if maybe I’d overdone it. Then Mariashrieked, nearly toppling off her chair with Jewel in her arms, and Hannah beamed like she’d known all along.
“You did it!” Maria clapped and Jewel blew a spit bubble.
I waved the fat envelope over my head like it was a trophy. “Spring semester, baby! Athens is gonna have no idea what hit it.”
Hannah crossed the room with that purposeful stride of hers and pulled me into a hug so fierce I thought she might crack my spine. “I knew you could. Didn’t I say? Didn’t I tell you?”
“Yes, ma’am, you did,” I wheezed into her shoulder.
Dalton’s voice rang out from behind the bar, dripping with mischief. “Well, look at us—college buddies.”
I turned, narrowing my eyes. “College buddies?”
“Sure,” he said, grinning, arms spread like it was obvious. “I’m on a football scholarship, psychology major. Same campus. Same stomping grounds. I’ll even show you the best coffee spots so you don’t flunk out first semester.”
I snorted. “Oh please. If anything, I’ll be tutoring you.”
Dalton held a hand to his chest in mock offense. “Bold words from a late-start freshman. Guess we’ll see who’s carrying whose GPA.”
The room bubbled with laughter and congratulations. Someone shoved a soda into my hand. Someone else slapped me on the back hard enough to make me stumble. Even Mac gave me a rare, approving nod from his corner.
Maria’s eyes shone as she reached for me. “See? You were so worried, and look at you now.”
“I was two seconds away from bribing the mailman,” I admitted, flopping into the chair beside her. Jewel gurgled at me, fist jammed in her mouth.
“Your niece approves,” Maria added, tilting the baby toward me.
“I’ll forgive her for drooling on my shirt, then,” I said, tickling Jewel’s foot. My whole body hummed with adrenaline, joy fizzing through me like soda bubbles. For once, the future didn’t feel like a fog—it felt real. Concrete. Like something I could reach out and grab.
Hannah settled beside me, her expression softer than I’d ever seen it. “You’ve taken the first step, Holly. And now we start building. We’ll make that shelter happen, one way or another.”
My throat tightened, and I nodded quickly before I embarrassed myself by crying in front of a room full of bikers.
I was mid-ramble about course catalogs and dorm options when the door opened and somehow the loud room got even louder. I peered over the shoulders of the people closest to me…and froze. Then slowly stood.
